Madam, - If Tom Cooney (Opinion & Analysis, February 14th) considers random breath-testing such an infringement of our liberties, how much more of an infringement are speed limits, traffic lights or any other petty restriction that hamper the free-born Irish driver?
Mr Cooney makes cogent points about the relative efficiency of "dragnet" testing and other methods, but for me the extremism of his initial premise undermines the rest of his case.
He says we should be appalled by the "spectre of mass intrusions upon the integrity of the person that mass-testing threatens" and expresses concern for mothers hurrying to collect children from creches running the risk of being prosecuted for evading police breath-testing roadblocks. Perhaps he could also visualise some of the appalling casualties on our roads, who are not spectral but real, and formulate an authoritative position on the rights of those victims and their relatives.
My own suggested approach to the problem is to harness technology to control, or at least monitor, the speed of individual cars automatically. Such a system is already in voluntary operation under one Irish insurance scheme.
Sensors built into cars could also probably be used to display or transmit a warning when an occupant has been drinking. But since such techniques have not yet found favour, I support random breath-testing, and suspect that, as with the smoking ban, the civil liberties sacrifice involved is one most democrats are willing to make. - Yours, etc,
PAUL NASH, Sandymount, Dublin 4.