Editorial: Don't let drinking drivers off hook

I'm not sure why anyone thought it would be a good idea to publicise the locations of police checkpoints on Facebook.

The sole purpose of this is to warn people which streets to avoid if they've been drinking too much or are speeding.

The result? Dangerous drunken drivers hooning down suburban back streets - just what we need.

The Daily Post reported yesterday on the Facebook pages, one called Rotorua Police Stop Locations and the other BOP Police Stop Locations.

The pages encourage people to report the locations of police drink-drive checkpoints and speed cameras.

Before being shut down at the weekend they had at least 300 and 1000 "likes" respectively.

Honestly - what's to like about this?

Ask the family of any victim of a drink driver - should drink drivers be given help to avoid police checkpoints?

Of course not.

Our story highlighted the fact that the Bay of Plenty has the second highest number of drink-driving arrests in the country.

As a community we shouldn't be making the police's job harder by encouraging dangerous, potentially lethal behaviour.

The pages were probably created as a lark, but the joke's over. Stopping drink drivers is a serious business - that's why we're happy to publish the names of convicted offenders once a month.

Why are people still getting behind the wheel after drinking? Only they know. Maybe they don't care. Maybe they don't think they'll be caught. It's vital that they are.