No room for Politics in Road Safety

We are at a critical juncture. We propose a First World road network. We impose Third World safety standards.

It is time to take the politics out of safety. As things currently stand, we are addressing the road safety issue from several perspectives.

All are worthy in their own right but, despite protestations to the contrary, there is every appearance of a lack of overall cohesion.

The case of young drivers is a potent example. We hear so much about them, their deaths, their habits, their menace. Yet, we permit them on our roads in killing machines with minimum training or supervision.

A Third World preparation for what can be a Next World journey for far too many.

There are no easy solutions except to say it has to be radical. Piecemeal is not sufficient. Neither is political sniping. We need a coordinated approach, and that includes our politicians. This is not an area for point scoring by either Government or Opposition. There have been one or two shameful examples of this in recent weeks.

Education is the key. And that means starting with future drivers while they are young and before they ever take to the road.

It means teaching them not only how to drive but how and why things happen when a car is driven in certain ways and under a variety of conditions.

Any reasonable appreciation of the dynamics of propulsion will quickly and permanently impress on their minds just how lethal is the weapon they aspire to drive. But this is aspirational. We do not have such an education system. We are nothing short of disgraceful in how we prepare our young drivers.

It would never be permitted in many leading European countries. It shouldn't be permitted here.

It doesn't matter who thought of it first but there is merit in providing free driving lessons for people at or during their transition year in second-level education.

There is also merit in encouraging safety in financial terms, either through lower insurance premia or subsidising cover from central funds.

The central principle needs to be grasped and acknowledged: alongside the stick of greater enforcement we must have the carrot of education.

There is no room for politics only clear coordinated thinking on this. But it must begin now.

One of the great drawbacks of a deterrent system - such as speed traps, checkpoints and electronic monitoring equipment - is that they are singularly rather than comprehensively effective.

Let me explain.

If you are caught speeding on a main thoroughfare two things can be said with a fair degree of certainty. The first is: you learn a painful lesson and won't speed there again.

The second is: you may be less cautious on a road you know does not have a speed trap. Being caught has made you wary but not necessarily a safer/better driver.

The hope is your overall speed would reduce. The reality may be different.

The central point is that deterrents tend to impose partial solutions rather than engender a comprehensively safer approach.

Of course, we must have deterrents and checks. But we also must have the encouragement of a safer disposition. A different mindset. And that is where education plays - or should play its part. At the moment it is minimal.

To our disgrace we fling our young drivers onto the maelstrom of motoring madness and expect them to be icons of sense and sensibility.

We are the guilty ones. As a society we are permitting a travesty, while we pay lip service to our young people being the leaders of tomorrow. We ill-equip them for taking to our roads.

Free driving lessons and insurance vouchers for all young people, as recently proposed, at the very least recognise this basic principle. We have to teach them the essential basics. For life.

We have to equip them with the knowledge, the mindset. For life.

At the moment they are taught little or nothing. Two years on a provisional licence obtained by submitting a few pounds. Two years during which they are - and let's be honest most are not accompanied - free to do as they please and not alone pick up all the bad habits but inculcate them.

Are we mad or what?

The most recent proposals come from Fine Gael. But their source should be immaterial.

What the main opposition party has done is pull together several strings of cohesive argument for a radical reappraisal of young drivers and the current driving test.

Anyone reading these pages for the past year or two will recognise several key elements frequently highlighted and proposed here.

There is merit in these proposals. We must hope we haven't to wait until FG manages to scramble a coalition government together to see them implemented.

Why can't we have these elements implemented immediately? Or are they politically tainted because they come from Fine Gael?

If so, it is a disgrace. There is no room for politics in road safety. If the Government have similar plans, let's hear them. But let's do something. Because these appear to be enormously sensible, pragmatic and practical.

Under this scenario the Government would pay for 25 hours of free tuition and give young learner drivers incentives to the value of £1,000 to improve their driving skills. The driving lessons would ultimately be made compulsory. The scheme would involve a 12-week education stint in second level schools, a pre-provisional licence theory test, hazard perception training, a structured driving course and a novice drivers log book signed by qualified instructors detailing each individual's progress.

It would be open to all young people in or out of school. And as reward for taking part, young drivers would get free driving lessons, £300 towards the cost of insurance and other discounts from the insurance industry. These could amount to as much as £1,000.

The total bill: £17m at the very most. A pittance in real terms when you consider what it costs to lay down a mile of new road. Nothing in terms of the potential to save life, limb and loved ones from trauma and misery.

That is why I find it extraordinary to hear at least one Government deputy saying these proposals offer no real alternative to the Coalition's. If that is the case then why don't we have them NOW?

Where there is a will there is a way and if these proposals have already been thought out by those with the power to implement them why are we waiting?