The fall in the number of drink-driving tests has undermined the campaign to put drink drivers off the road, it was claimed tonight.
The number of suspected drunken drivers forced to give breath samples fell to 8,058 last year compared to 8,948 two years earlier.
Labour Party transport spokesman Roisin Shorthall said the level of breath testing conducted by gardai was totally insufficient.
"Given the continuing problem with drink-driving and road deaths, one would have expected a massive increase in enforcement levels. But these figures are rather disappointing and fall far short of what is required to tackle this issue seriously," she said.
Ms Shorthall obtained figures on the level of breath-testing in a reply to a Dail question.
They show that in Caherciveen in Kerry the number of breath tests fell from 12 in 2002 to two last year, while in Clifden they increased from two in 2002 to 34 last year.
In Gort, Nenagh and Trim, there were no breath tests at all in 2002 but these stations later increased their number of tests last year to 31, 81 and 104 respectively.
The number of breath tests has nearly halved in Ballina and Thurles in the last two years, while in Tralee the number has dropped from 180 in 2002 to 43 last year. There were some stations which managed to increase their number of tests, such as Clonmel and Galway.
"Clearly there are varied activity levels among different Garda stations, suggesting an ambiguous attitude to drink driving enforcement in certain parts of the country," said Ms Shorthall.
But according to gardai, the number of drink drivers arrested up to the end of October this year has increased by 15 per cent to 9,050.
Gardai are required to form an opinion that a motorist is drunk, or wait until they are involved in an accident, before they are allowed to breathalyse them.
The Government promised to introduce random breath testing but it has blamed legal difficulties for the two-year delay.
PA