David Macnamara says he and his dad, whose name is also David Macnamara, had a close relationship. Photo / Supplied
The Government has a target of zero road deaths, but how achievable is that when drink-driving, a significant contributing factor to fatal crashes, remains prevalent in New Zealand? Tara Shaskey reports.
David Macnamara bears the painful consequences of drink-driving every day.
He was only 6 years old when his father made the fatal decision to get behind the wheel while drunk and possibly on drugs.
On the road, the 42-year-old, whose name was also David Macnamara, was travelling alone at the time and attempted to overtake a truck, but instead nicked the back of the heavy vehicle and spun out.
He died on impact and his son’s life changed forever.
“It really sucked growing up without him. I had my mum to talk to, but you don’t always want to talk to your mum about boy problems.
“Me and Dad were really close, my mum told me. She said we used to play a lot of games together.”
But he can’t recall those special moments. Now 23 years old, Macnamara’s memories of his father have completely faded, and what remains instead is the void left by his death.
“I miss him 100 per cent. I really wish he was still here.”
The Taranaki man is only one of an enormous number of New Zealanders whose lives have been impacted by the ripple effect of drink-driving tragedies.
Now his loss has motivated him to help turn around the country’s drink-driving culture, which he describes as rife.
For the past two years, Macnamara has been cruising the streets of New Plymouth in his bright green 1997 Toyota Starlet, fondly named Groovy Kermit, offering to sober drive party-goers for a koha.
He’s often seen at the wheel, bopping along to his booming drum and bass music while wearing an animal hat of some variety.
For Macnamara, his sober-driving mission is as much about spreading positivity and making connections as it is about helping to get people home safely.
“I’m just doing my part to make a small difference. Because in my honest opinion, New Zealand’s trying to get to zero road deaths, but it’s not going to happen, it’s a load of rubbish.”
It’s not that Macnamara doesn’t want the Road to Zero strategy to succeed, but he points out that alcohol and drugs remain a leading contributor to the country’s “very high” road toll, and it would be near impossible to shift the “she’ll be right” attitudes of many who continue to take the risk.
The Government’s strategy was introduced in 2019 and has a long-term goal of no deaths or serious injuries on our roads with an interim target of a 40 per cent reduction by 2030, based on 2018′s benchmark of 378 road deaths.
Currently, one person, on average, dies every day on New Zealand roads, and another is injured every hour. As of mid-December, more than 350 people had already lost their lives to road crashes this year. Between 2018 and 2020, alcohol or drugs were a factor in 44 per cent of fatal crashes.
These statistics remain “unacceptably high”, the Government declared in its strategy.
“Other countries similar to New Zealand do not have the same rates of road deaths and serious injuries. We can and should do better,” it reads.
In 2005, the year Macnamara’s father died, the number of fatalities in crashes where alcohol and/or drugs were a contributing factor sat at 115. That was a significant decline from the earlier decade, which saw a devastating 321 in 1990 before trending downward to 200 in 1995, and 122 in 1999.
Then, in the decade after Macnamara Snr died, road deaths involving alcohol or drugs reached historic lows, with 87 recorded in 2011 and 73 in 2013.
But those shrinking figures did not continue - instead, the numbers did a U-turn and began to climb.
Experts have emphasised that driving while under the influence remains a significant issue for New Zealand, with some doubtful the Government is equipped to tackle it.
Others are calling for harsher penalties for impaired motorists in an effort to drive down the road toll.
Fuelling those viewpoints are the near-idle conviction rates of drink-drivers, the plummeting number of roadside breath tests performed by police, the Government’s failure to meet the strategy’s targets – and, of course, the unrelenting road toll.
According to Waka Kotahi, from 2015 to 2021 alcohol was a factor in at least 521 road deaths. That figure would be higher if it also considered drugs as a contributing factor.
In that same period, the Ministry of Justice recorded 74,226 convictions nationwide for driving with an excess breath alcohol level of more than 400 micrograms per litre of breath or a blood alcohol level of more than 80 milligrams per 100 millilitres of blood. Of those convictions, 2021 produced 9439, which was down from 2015′s 11,107. The decrease only occurred during the height of the pandemic and Covid-related court delays.
The recidivism rate for those same seven years sits at 21,470, which represents the number of convictions for excess breath alcohol third or subsequent – meaning a person has been convicted three or more times for driving over the adult alcohol limits.
Director of Brake New Zealand, Caroline Perry, says the national road safety charity supports the Road to Zero strategy, which is based on Vision Zero – a global movement that has seen significant decreases in road trauma in Sweden, New York and parts of Australia.
But the Government needs to pick up the pace if it wants to reach its interim goal.
Measures from the strategy’s three-year action plan need to be implemented faster, and other elements of the strategy that weren’t included in that initial plan need to be brought forward, Perry says.
Waka Kotahi’s latest annual report shows it failed to meet all but one of its targets in the Road to Zero campaign, with breath testing and reducing speed limits lagging the most. It also failed to meet a number of its measures last year.
In recent years, police breath-testing numbers have fallen well short of its annual target of 3 million tests, as committed to in the strategy. Only 1.6m were conducted in 2019, before figures slumped further to 1.3m in 2020, and then climbed to 1.5m in 2021.
Perry says there needs to be better enforcement and deterrence measures.
“These are an important part of tackling drink-driving.
“Random breath testing helps to take drink-drivers off our roads and acts as a deterrent, but we need to have enough police resource to ensure the chance of being breath-tested is high so people see it as a deterrent.”
She believes the country has “some good tools” as part of its penalties for drink-driving, but says it is lacking when compared to other countries.
In New Zealand, a driver over the age of 20 with an alcohol level between 251 and 400mcg per litre of breath, or between 51 and 80mg per 100ml of blood, would avoid court and receive a fine and 50 demerit points.
Conversely, in Victoria, Australia, a driver with those same levels would face a heftier fine, a disqualification, they would need to have an alcohol interlock installed and have to attend a drink-driving programme.
Other countries, such as Denmark, Finland, Norway and Scotland, automatically charge drivers displaying that level of alcohol with an offence, leading to court proceedings and a disqualification period.
But a recent Waka Kotahi report on alcohol-related crash trends stated that it isn’t until a driver in New Zealand is caught with an alcohol level of more than 400mcg per litre of breath, or 80mg per 100ml of blood, that they would appear in court and face disqualification, coupled with a fine.
More serious and recidivist drink-driving offending could land a driver with an alcohol interlock device, which is wired into their vehicle to prevent it starting if alcohol is detected on their breath, or with a term of home detention, or imprisonment.
But Darroch Ball, of lobby group the Sensible Sentencing Trust, believes the courts’ response to high-level and repeat drink-driving often falls short of the more serious punishments available. He says those offenders need to be dealt with “severely”.
His comments were made only a few months after a man was sentenced to 12 months of home detention and community work for killing a Christchurch woman in a crash he caused while speeding, under the influence of alcohol, and with five previous drink-driving convictions.
“These are the offenders who clearly don’t care about their actions or about the safety of others on the road. We need these dangerous offenders off our streets,” Ball says.
“New Zealand has one of the lowest sentencing structures and fines for drink-driving in the world. If our system doesn’t hold offenders to account properly or ensure an effective deterrent is in place, then repeat offenders will just continue to offend.”
While Justice Minister Kiri Allan acknowledges deterring people from reoffending is among the purposes of the Sentencing Act, so is assisting the offender’s rehabilitation and reintegration, she says.
Allan says penalties are one means of deterrence, but beyond a point are a “relatively weak” tool for reducing crime.
“In part, because research shows that people’s behaviour is more influenced by the likelihood of being caught rather than the likely sentencing outcome.
“This is particularly the case with offences committed under the influence of alcohol or drugs.”
Waka Kotahi’s Road to Zero portfolio manager Tara MacMillan says penalties for drink-driving are currently being reviewed to ensure they are “fit for purpose”, but no decisions have been made as yet.
As part of the agency’s work to reduce drink-driving rates, tackling high-level and recidivist drink-driving is one of its three key areas.
The strategy outlines a need to address the underlying issues which lead to some people’s offending, rather than responding solely to the behaviour itself.
That will include a new approach to dealing with the most high-risk drivers, providing alternative resolutions to convictions and supporting locally-led prevention programmes to reduce recidivism.
MacMillan says the other key areas are enforcement - by having police visible on the roads and targeting drink-drivers - and awareness through its advertising and education campaigns.
Drink-driving is “absolutely” a road safety issue, and fatality figures involving alcohol remain “unacceptably high”.
But alcohol can’t be considered in isolation, she says, explaining a person could be under the influence and also driving a vehicle with a two-star rating, or they’ve crossed a centre line while speeding and there’s no median barrier in place.
That’s why the strategy has a number of focus areas, including infrastructure, vehicle safety and speed, to ensure it reaches its goal.
And that goal is still “absolutely achievable”, MacMillan says, acknowledging the ongoing failures to meet a number of the strategy’s interim measures.
She says the strategy is a “proven recipe” and the reports have been a good guide to determining the timeline.
“There are some areas where we need to pick up the pace, and we need to go a little bit harder and faster. And that’s absolutely what we’re focused on.”
But National Party spokesperson for transport Simeon Brown is less than convinced.
He says the Government’s approach to road safety is “entirely misplaced”.
“Instead of slowing everyone down and reducing speed limits, Labour needs to prioritise the fundamentals like drink-driving testing,” he says, citing the “very concerning” police breath-testing figures.
“Drug and drink-driving are big issues in this country, and National has been calling on the Government to take action.”
Earlier this year, Parliament passed the Land Transport (Drug Driving) Amendment legislation which introduces roadside drug testing from 2023.
But Brown says the testing should have been in force earlier, and pointed out Labour had voted down National’s Bill on the issue in 2018.
“Every year of delay has resulted in more deaths and accidents on our roads.”
On the breath-testing numbers, acting road policing director Inspector Mike Brooklands says recent years have been challenging for road policing duties due to Covid restrictions and redeployment of officers.
The failure to meet the police targets is not reflective of officers’ commitment to reducing road deaths and serious injury, he says.
“Our people are extremely passionate about keeping people safe, and every single day they are out there educating and enforcing safe driving behaviour.”
Brooklands says a lot of work has been done to boost the breath-testing numbers, and in the 12 months to October 31, police conducted 2.1m, with that volume expected to increase in coming months.
“Police is committed to increasing our efforts, using general and specific deterrence, and is continuing to take the appropriate prevention and enforcement action necessary to reduce death and serious injury on New Zealand roads.”
Brake’s key messages on drink-driving:
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