On the adjournment of the debate, I had been outlining the general case for increasing fines for road traffic offences, this being the main purpose of the Bill. But, as the Minister emphasised in his opening speech and as a number of Deputies have also pointed out, the apparatus of traffic law enforcement and penalties is only one element, although a necessary one, in securing the safe and efficient use of our roads. The regime of penalties now being updated must be accompanied by a range of positive measures to provide better or alternative facilities for motorists and to promote good road behaviour voluntarily from the public at large.
I would like to assure Deputies that the Bill's concentration on penal measures is not preventing the ongoing development on many other fronts of measures to improve roads and traffic systems. A total of £123.5 million is being provided in State road grants this year compared with £117.5 million in 1984. Of this, some £98 million is directed towards enlarging and improving the capacity of our road system as well as eliminating accident black spots and the balance of £25.5 million is being applied to road maintenance.
Deputies Fitzsimons and David Andrews argued that common sense and courtesy should prevail in the administration of road traffic law. I fully support this view. The Bill provides a framework for enforcement, but I am sure that all concerned with implementing it will continue to respect the ultimate purpose of road traffic law, which is to promote voluntary observance of the rules of the road by all.
Several suggestions have been made for improving present road traffic legislation beyond the simple updating of penalties with which the Bill is concerned. In general it must be said that the framework of controls provided by the major Road Traffic Acts, those of 1961 and 1968, has proved a very adequate and comprehensive one.
Nonetheless, a number of constructive suggestions have been made on matters which would require amendment of the Road Traffic Acts and these are certainly entitled to closer examination. I explained to the House earlier and the Minister did in his Second Reading speech that we have in mind several legislative improvements which I hope to bring before the House in a further Road Traffic Bill later this year. I will have full regard to the debate which has just taken place in preparing this second Bill. In the meantime, however, my general view is that the contents of the present Bill are suitably self-contained and urgent. I would not wish the Bill to be delayed by consideration of proposals which might require further detailed examination at this stage.
One matter referred to by several Deputies was the introduction of mandatory display of insurance discs on vehicles. The Government have already put on record their commitment to this in their statement of October 1983 on the recommendations of the Motor Insurance Report. Consultation with the insurance companies must be completed however before the new system can be put into operation. I would hope to be able to include an enabling legislative provision in the Road Traffic Bill to be introduced later this year.
Deputies addressed themselves both to the specific content of the Bill, the revision of penalties, and to a variety of wider issues affecting road traffic, motor insurance and road safety. A concern expressed by a number of Deputies was that the increases proposed by the Bill in the maximum fine under the general penalty might be excessive in relation to certain relatively minor offences, such as illegal parking. I would like to stress first of all that the amounts of £150 for a first offence or £350 for certain second and subsequent offences are maxima only. They represent the upper limits within which the District Courts will have to work in dealing with the vast range of road traffic offences, nearly 500,000 in 1982 coming before them each year. What we are fixing here is the framework for enforcement rather than the fines which are actually going to be applied in particular cases.
That said, there are a number of good reasons in favour of the increases being proposed in the general penalty limits. They are still less than what would be strictly justified to restore 1961 money values to those of 1984. They are needed to allow the amounts prescribed for on-the-spot penalties to be fixed at more realistic levels; at present the maximum general penalty of £20 means that on-the-spot fines, normally £5, have to be set at a level insufficient to deter drivers from inconsiderate parking. We see that all over the city. Some drivers take a chance and run the risk of having to pay a fine of £5. If this fine were fixed at a much higher figure, they would think twice about illegal parking. It is hoped that the present Bill will stand for some time. It is only sensible therefore to set new maximum limits at a level which will maintain a reasonable deterrent for some years to come.
In this last connection, Deputy Molony made the suggestion that the amounts of fines in legislation generally should be automatically index-linked to rising prices. No doubt the Attorney General will look at this suggestion but I am not sure that Deputies generally would welcome it. The present debate has elicited a number of genuinely held differences among Members of the House as to the appropriate level of increase for certain penalties, and not all Deputies may be disposed to waive their right of comment on those matters in favour of an automatic mechanism.
Some Deputies have urged the case for a more extensive use of mandatory minimum penalties in dealing with road traffic offences. I might mention, that in so far as people choose to avail of it, the system of so-called on-the-spot fines represents a fixed payment in respect of certain road traffic offences, and I will be reviewing the scope of this system following the enactment of the present Bill.
But on the substantive question of mandatory minimum fines, the Minister touched on the difficulties involved in the course of his Second Reading speech. In 1982, road traffic offences represented 74 per cent of all prosecutions brought to the District Courts and by their number and diversity present a wide variety of different circumstances. The administration of justice is the constitutional prerogative of the courts and applying minimun penalties across a wide or numerous range of offences would not seem consistent with this principle.
Mandatory or, as they are legally known, consequential disqualifications from driving are a different matter. The courts have held that the holding of a driving licence is a privilege rather than a right and that disqualification from driving is not therefore in the strict legal sense a penalty. Mandatory disqualification from driving applies across a considerable range of serious road traffic offences; most drunk driving offences attract it upon first conviction as does dangerous driving resulting in death or serious bodily harm to another person. Uninsured driving, driving a dangerously defective vehicle, and a number of other offences involve mandatory disqualification upon a second or subsequent conviction for that offence within three years. In addition, it may not perhaps be widely appreciated that the courts have discretion at all times to impose a disqualification from driving in relation to any offence which involves a mechanically propelled vehicle or the driving of such a vehicle.
Deputy Joe Doyle mentioned the possibility of a points system of disqualification from driving such as operates in the United Kingdom. A computerised system of driver licensing is a necessary pre-condition for this kind of system and I now have such computerisation under consideration. It would be clearly premature, then, to speculate just yet on the feasibility of a points system here.
Finally on the question of penalties, some confusion has arisen both in this debate and in the public comment on the Bill regarding the relevance of on-the-spot parking notices to the determination of whether a first or subsequent traffic offence is involved. If a person pays the so-called fine on-the-spot, there is no prosecution and therefore no court proceedings. Should the person be brought before the court on some other parking offence, any offence in respect of which a fine on-the-spot had been duly paid would not come into the reckoning in determining whether a first or subsequent offence was involved.
Deputies commented widely on matters connected with, but not arising directly from, the present Bill. Both Deputy Gay Mitchell and Deputy Briscoe suggested the establishment of special traffic courts and Deputy David Andrews argued for a special traffic corps within the Garda Síochána. Responsibility for both the administration of the courts and the organisation of the Garda rests with my colleague, the Minister for Justice, and I will bring these and all other relevant points arising from this debate to his attention. As I understand it, however, two special traffic courts — one for parking and one for non-parking offences — already exist for Dublin city, where a great number of offences take place, and a traffic corps does exist within the Garda organisation. Indeed, despite the obvious and unfortunate demands being placed on Garda resources by serious crime, Garda involvement in the road traffic area is still considerable, with an estimated 25 per cent of all Garda time being devoted at present to road traffic enforcement.
Deputies had many valid points to make about the general road safety position in this country and about particular measures which might be developed to improve it. Deputy Molony quoted extensively from the Motor Insurance Report of December 1982, action on many of those recommendations is now being prepared by the Ministers concerned. Deputy David Andrews called for a special inquiry into the causes of road accidents, whether by way of a commission or otherwise.
I fully share Deputies' concern in this vital matter. However, without wishing to relent in the slightest from the on-going road safety effort, I feel that certain general facts should be placed before the House to balance some of the more extreme indictments of Irish motoring which have been made. The rate of fatal and serious injury accidents in Ireland is now below what, based on an objective internationally accepted statistical formula, one might expect from our present degree of motorisation. In terms of road deaths per vehicle kilometres travelled, our record is bettered at the moment only by two countries within the EEC, the United Kingdom and Denmark.
Deputy Molony, and the recent motor insurance report from which he drew, rightly identify better road behaviour and a decreased rate of accidents as an important means of abating motor insurance costs. Unfortunately, the road accident rate is not the sole determinant of these insurance costs. Indeed, a question which remains to be answered, notwithstanding the valuable analysis of the motor insurance report, is why with the rate of fatal and serious injury road accidents per registered vehicle having virtually halved over the past 12 years, motor insurance costs have continued to escalate.
I fully respect the intention and concern reflected in Deputy David Andrews's suggestion for a comprehensive inquiry into the causes of road accidents. However, through the on-going work of An Foras Forbartha, in particular, as well as of other agencies, the general patterns of accident casualty and location in this country are already well understood. The real priority is to implement effective road accident counter-measures all over the country. In this connection, detailed investigations of high-accident locations, such as the on-going work conducted by An Foras on rural sections of national roads and the excellent study recently completed by them for Dundalk, may be of more practical benefit than the kind of formal and generalised inquiry which Deputy David Andrews seems to be advocating.
I fully endorse the support for the campaign of arm band wearing by pedestrians expressed by Deputies Enright and Noel Treacy. The year 1982 saw a remarkable reduction of 65 in the number of adult pedestrians killed in road accidents and shows the enormous potential of measures aimed at precautionary behaviour on the part of pedestrians.
Deputy Molony raised the possibility of reinstating, by means of a suitable amendment, section 57 of the Road Traffic Act, 1961 which the High Court found repugnant to the Constitution in 1977. I am advised that the simple grounds of the High Court judgment — that the section exceeded the local and limited jurisdiction of the lower courts — make it impractical to think of reinstating it.
Deputies Taylor, L. T. Cosgrave and David Andrews all mentioned the role of public transport. As the Minister responsible for roads and traffic administration, I do not see the needs of roads and of public transport as being in conflict with one another.
Rail has been meeting a diminishing proportion of transport needs in most countries. This is so to a marked degree in Ireland where it now carries 4 per cent only of inland passenger and 10 per cent of freight traffic. However, road needs are so far from being adequately served by our present system that whatever contribution rail still can make must be more than welcomed.
But public transport itself is now using roads predominantly in its passenger operations and, in general, stands to benefit from the systematic programme of road improvements being developed on our national and major urban routes. Traffic management measures can also as a matter of policy be developed in support of public transport. Bus priority measures are being implemented to good effect in the Dublin area.
Deputies L. T. Cosgrave and David Andrews raised a matter not strictly comprehended by the road traffic code in their calls for a motor tax office for South Dublin and, if possible, for Dún Laoghaire. I have previously made it clear that the establishment of a further motor tax office is being studied by Dublin Corporation as a matter of urgency. I will keep the House in touch with any such developments. Finally, Deputy David Andrews asked me to comment specifically on suggestions he made for improving the flow of traffic on commuter routes at peak times, known in traffic engineering terms as the tidal flow concept, this would involve using, say, a third lane of a four lane road for the benefit of town-bound traffic during the morning peak time and reversing it to the normal direction thereafter. This kind of tidal flow adjustment has indeed been used satisfactorily abroad as a traffic management measure. Unfortunately, it requires roadways either without junctions or with junctions different in level to the main carriageway.
The source of congestion on the Blackrock to town route mentioned by Deputy David Andrews is at its junctions. Tidal flow could not cope with these since the removal of right-turn lanes, islands and traffic signals ahead signs would be required each time the third lane flow was to be changed.
This has been a wide and detailed debate. I have been able to respond to it generally and selectively. I would like to assure Deputies, however, that I will be looking more closely at all of their suggestions, particularly with the prospect of the further Road Traffic Bill which we hope to introduce later this year. In the meantime, the present Bill will provide a strengthened framework to which the Garda, traffic wardens and the courts are entitled, for enforcing existing road traffic law. I thank Deputies for their constructive contributions and suggestions.
I commend the Bill to the House.
