THE HEAD of the Garda Inspectorate Kathleen O’Toole has taken issue with many aspects of the Garda’s approach to road policing despite road fatalities having dropped to an all-time low last year.
Ms O’Toole has suggested the role of the Garda Traffic Corps should be redefined saying it had too much influence over local Garda management. She questioned why speed limits were not standardised as in other countries and said basic information, such as the number of fatalities in which alcohol played a part, was unavailable.
“We were unable to get the statistics to show what percentage [of fatalities] are due to alcohol,” she told TDs and Senators at an Oireachtas Committee on Justice meeting yesterday.
While road fatalities reached record lows last year there was “no room for complacency” if an EU target of no more than 252 deaths per year was to be reached by 2012.
Responding to questions about drug-driving, she said the technology for roadside testing similar to that for alcohol would not be available for three to five years. The former Boston police chief questioned methods used to set speed limits on Irish roads, saying speed remained the most common factor in road fatalities.
Senator Jim Walsh (FF) said on some roads speed limits dropped for apparently no reason on stretches before increasing again for no apparent reason.
Ms O’Toole said: “I have to say, there seems to be less standardisation of speed limits in this country than I have seen elsewhere.”
Senator Walsh suggested that some gardaí view issuing speeding notices as a measure of productivity rather than as a tool for improving safety and saving lives. Ms O’Toole replied that if more lives were to be saved on the roads, the Garda need to “develop strategies specificallyargeted at achieving outcomes” instead of an any “fish in a barrel” approach.
Ms O’Toole believes the Garda needs to make a series of other road policing changes. Local superintendents should have more input into the activities of the Garda Traffic Corps in their area, she said. The corps should become a headquarters for enforcement, “developing policy and communicating agenda”. Enforcement should then be delegated locally to those who police the areas “where the rubber meets the road”.
She said too many people were still dying on Irish roads. Deaths were down to 276 last year, a fall of almost 200 on 1998. Ireland’s record on combating road fatalities was ninth in Europe in 2007, up from 14th in 2005.
Ms O’Toole also said she is concerned at the number of gardaí (2,600) driving Garda vehicles on the permission of chief superintendents instead of undergoing advanced driving courses. This “very unusual” practice was putting lives at risk and should stop because the Garda should “lead by example”.
