BROUGHAN, PARC AND CLANCY FAMILY EXPRESS DISAPPOINTMENT AT TRANSPORT MINISTER’S INACTION
This morning, during oral Parliamentary Questions with the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport, Shane Ross, it was confirmed that the promised Section 39 of the Road Traffic Act 2016 which was signed into law 10 months ago, has not yet been commenced and it seems as if it will not be commenced despite promises to the contrary. Section 39 inserts new Section 35A into the 1961 Act making vehicle owners liable for allowing unaccompanied learner drivers to drive their vehicles and was inserted in to the Bill in response to calls from Mr Noel Clancy who tragically lost his wife and daughter in a road traffic collision with an unaccompanied learner driver in December 2015.
On the 20th of December last year in a Department press release Minister Ross said that he would “engage with the Office of the Attorney General as quickly as possible in the New Year to ensure that this provision is sufficiently robust for early commencement and enforcement”. Minister Ross also told RTE news on the 6th January “We have responded to the Clancy’s tragedy by amending the Bill in the Dáil to ensure that people who lend their cars to learner drivers are committing a criminal offence”. Today Deputy Broughan, representatives of PARC and Mr Noel Clancy himself have condemned this empty rhetoric which has only come to light because of Deputy Broughan raising the question as a priority.
Ms Susan Gray of PARC says “PARC road safety group yet again feel let down by a Minister. Every member of PARC has lost one or more members of their family in road traffic collisions. All we are trying to do is to make our roads safer so that other families do not have to endure the pain we endure on a daily basis. It is galling for us to see the uncaring and irresponsible attitude of some politicians to drink driving, penalty point offences etc and we add, due to his inactions on this issue and others Minister Ross to that list.”
Mr Noel Clancy said “I am bitterly disappointed at the response of Minister Shane Ross. I have no doubt that my wife Geraldine and my daughter Louise would be alive today had the car owner, in our case not given his car to his daughter to drive unaccompanied. This disregard for the law went unpunished as there is no offence under current law for a vehicle owner to be charged under. His actions made a widower of me and a criminal of his own daughter. The Gardaí and the DPP need the power to charge this type of car owner with a criminal offence”.
Deputy Broughan says “Yet again it is up to the work of volunteers, civic society groups and opposition Deputies to hold the Government to account. Why must we always be chasing up on life saving measures to ensure that they are implemented? Government Ministers love a good news story but then they fail to tell us when problems arise or when their promises were false. The Minister claims that there are legal issues around the matter but I do not see how. If a learner driver is unaccompanied, i.e. with no other experienced, fully licensed driver in the car, as per the legal definitions already outlined, then the vehicle owner should be held accountable. This was what the Minister accepted in his Bill and what he promised to Mr Noel Clancy. It is unacceptable for us to be told now that there are problems with this section. Gardaí must also immediately be given the power to seize the vehicles of learner drivers driving unaccompanied. It is laughable that they can stop someone, take their details and then have to allow them to continue driving.”
ENDS For more information contact Deputy Tommy Broughan at (01) 618 3557
Contact Susan Gray, PARC at 086-377 3784
Contact Noel Clancy at 087-237 8736
Tags: PARC, road safety, Road Traffic Bill 2016, Unaccompanied drivers
