Cabinet to approve plans to close loopholes for drivers

Drivers will no longer be able to avail of a legal loophole which lets them avoid penalty points or longer disqualifications by accepting disqualifications as short as one day under new measures due to go Cabinet on Wednesday.

Minister of State for Transport Jack Chambers will seek Cabinet approval to publish the Road Traffic Bill, which aims to reduce road deaths through lower speed limits and additional penalty-point measures. He will tell his ministerial colleagues, however, that plans to introduce increased penalty points for offences committed during bank holiday weekend periods cannot be introduced in this legislation as it requires more detailed scrutiny.

In his memo Mr Chambers will also detail two anomalies in existing legislation that he plans to address. The first is a legal loophole in current road traffic laws where a driver can end up banned from driving for one day rather than six months. This relates to section 2.8 of the Road Traffic Act 2002 which provides, where a person admits or is convicted of a penalty-points offence and an ancillary disqualification order is made in respect of that offence, that those penalty points may not be endorsed on the person’s licence.

The second anomaly the Government plans to address is to one that stopped gardaí from detaining motorists during the period after they have provided a sample for drug testing and before a result is processed.

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The fresh legislation will also introduce measures where multiple penalty points can be applied in a single stop where more than one offence is detected. Under the existing Road Traffic Act 2002 where a person commits more than one penalty-point offence on the same occasion they receive only one set of penalty points for the highest offence committed.

The Bill also legislates for the new speed limits which were originally recommended by a speed limit review published in September. The review recommended default speed limit changes of 50km/h to 30km/h for “built-up areas”; from 100km/h to 80km/h for national secondary roads; and from 80km/h to 60km/h on rural or local roads where three quarters of all road fatalities occurred last year.

Mr Chambers will tell Cabinet that speed continues to be one of the single biggest contributors in road collisions, and reducing default speed limits will help to reduce collisions and save lives.

The setting of speed limits for Irish roads is a devolved power of local authorities. Detailed guidance will be sent to each local authority advising on the approach for determining appropriate speed limits for different types of roads. There could be upward variations of speed limits where a road is deemed to be safe and good quality on assessment by local authorities.

Under further measures drug testing will also be made mandatory at the scene of a serious collision on the same basis as currently exists for alcohol testing. There were 155 fatalities in all of 2022.

Separately, Minister for Health Stephen Donnelly will tell Cabinet that enabling works are now due to get under way at the new National Maternity Hospital site in Elm Park campus this week. The works will deliver upgrades to electrical systems for the entire campus, new buildings to accommodate a neurology ward, medical records and a staff canteen, as well as new boilers.

Those facilities are currently on the footprint of where the National Maternity Hospital will be built and need to be moved to facilitate the development of the new hospital. The procurement process for the main contract for the new hospital is still under way. Once the procurement process is completed and the “business case” is updated, Mr Donnelly will return to Cabinet for approval to award the main contract.

Meanwhile the Minister for Higher Education Simon Harris will on Wednesday seek Government approval to establish a new research and innovation funding agency, Taighde Éireann – Research Ireland.

Minister for the Environment Eamon Ryan will also bring the 2024 Climate Plan to Cabinet.

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