Opinion: More breath tests must be conducted on our roads to address the drink-driving problem

The number of convictions for driving under the influence has shrunk in recent years. Photo / Getty Images

OPINION

Stronger action needs to be taken against drunk driving.

It comes as local police say they are cracking down on impaired drivers with data showing roughly 120 people were caught drink-driving on Bay of Plenty roads every month this year.

The latest police figures reveal between January and September this year, 1081 drivers were caught, including 950 in Tauranga and Western Bay, 367 in Rotorua, 354 in Eastern Bay and 360 in Taupō. This compares to 1364 for the entire 2021 calendar year.

That’s dumbfounding when the presence of alcohol and/or drugs is detected in drivers in more than a third of all fatal crashes in this country.

In 2021 nationally there were 318 deaths on the roads, of which 128 people died where driver alcohol or drugs were a contributing factor.

There is a zero alcohol limit for drivers under 20. Those caught with an alcohol level of fewer than 150 micrograms per litre of breath, or less than 30 milligrams per 100 millilitres of blood, could be fined and given 50 demerit points. Those with higher could be disqualified from driving, given 50 demerit points and either fined or imprisoned.

Drivers aged 20 or over must not have more than 250 micrograms per litre of breath or more than 50 milligrams per 100 millilitres of blood. Those with an alcohol level between 251 and 400 micrograms or between 51 and 80 milligrams could be fined and given 50 demerit points. If it’s higher, drivers could be disqualified from driving and either fined or imprisoned.

If you’re like me, those numbers don’t mean anything.

I don’t know how many alcoholic drinks I can have before I reach these limits but NZTA says it depends on many factors such as whether you are male or female, your size, and how much food you have eaten.

Because of this, its advice is: if you drink at all, don’t drive.

The trouble with leaving things down to personal responsibility is that it differs from person to person.

And drinking alcohol doesn’t do wonders for people’s judgments either because booze makes it harder for the prefrontal cortex to work as it should, disrupting decision-making and rational thought.

Changing our drinking culture seems to be an impossible task. To see that happen, it must become more expensive, advertising restricted and reduced availability but I can’t see that happening any time soon.

That’s why more random breath tests are a must.

In 2011/12, there were about 2,700,000 breath tests conducted but in 2021/22, there were 1,592,286 conducted, police annual reports show.

That’s a massive reduction and interestingly there were only 87 road deaths where alcohol was a contributing factor in 2011 and 104 in 2012, Ministry of Transport data shows.

Meanwhile, the number of people convicted for driving under the influence has shrunk from 23,376 in 2012/13 to 13,060 in 2021/22.

The numbers would suggest we’re not taking drink-driving as seriously as we once did.

That must be addressed in 2023 if we want to see fewer deaths on our roads.