[Article] Ahern hopes high road deaths will change attitudes

Ahern hopes high road deaths will change attitudes
From:ireland.com
Monday, 17th July, 2006

Taoiseach Bertie Ahern said yesterday he hoped the sadness evoked by the high death rate on the roads would touch "the psyche of the community", writes Ruadhán Mac Cormaic.

He was speaking after a weekend that saw six people killed on the Republic's roads, among them three teenage girls.

"It's like all of the accidents - they are horrific and they are all very sad stories for the families, for friends and for communities," Mr Ahern said.

"All we can continue to do is to urge people to show caution."

He added: "None of these accidents makes anyone other than very sad, and I hope that just gets through to the psyche of the community. The people who can do something about it, to be frank with you, are the people who are driving cars every day."

The year's death toll climbed to over 220 this weekend. In the latest incident, a 77-year-old woman was killed when she was struck by a car while crossing the road in the village of Dromineer, Co Tipperary, at about 1pm yesterday. She was Juliana Roberts from Dromineer.

In Co Kilkenny, 14-year-old Catherine Doyle, from Mile Post, Slieverue, was killed on Saturday evening when the car in which she was a front-seat passenger hit a wall at Hugginstown shortly after 8pm. Her body was removed to Waterford Regional Hospital, Ardkeen.

Less than 24 hours earlier, two 15-year-old girls died when the car in which they were travelling hit a ditch in Co Limerick.

The crash happened at 12.50am on Saturday at Killinane, Galbally.

Leanne Miller, of Kilteely in Limerick, died instantly. The second girl, who was a rear-seat passenger, died from injuries sustained in the crash in Limerick Regional Hospital yesterday morning. The girls had been returning home from a teenage disco in Co Tipperary when the car left the road on a bend. Two young men, one the driver, were treated in hospital for minor injuries.

Elsewhere in Co Limerick, a 20-year-old man died when the van he was driving was involved in a single-vehicle crash at Tournafulla at about 5am yesterday. A local, he was named as John Roche.

In Co Wexford, a 27-year-old motorcyclist, Stephen Cleary, from Clonskeagh, in Dublin, was killed when his bike collided with a car at 7am yesterday on the Arklow Road in Gorey.

A senior Catholic bishop said yesterday accepting the inevitability of carnage on the roads was not a Christian option.

In a letter read at Masses across the Diocese of Killaloe, Dr Willie Walsh said: "If each one of us takes more seriously our obligation to drive carefully, our obligation not to indulge in alcohol or other drugs when driving, our obligation to obey the rules of the road and not to ignore speed limits, then lives will be saved and we will have less broken-hearted parents, brothers, sisters and friends carrying a burden of sadness throughout their lives."

Only when those responsibilities are taken seriously can we demand that politicians, gardaí and other road-users do the same, he added.

Ahern 'slow down' plea as six more die on the roads
From:The Irish Independent
Monday, 17th July, 2006




TAOISEACH Bertie Ahern yesterday dramatically intervened in the road carnage debate, insisting it was up to drivers to "slow down a bit".

Mr Ahern urged people to show caution behind the wheel as the road death toll continued to rise, with six people - five of them teenagers or in their 20s - losing their lives.

Two accidents in counties Kilkenny and Limerick claimed the lives of three young teenage girls over the weekend.

A 20-year-old man was killed in a separate early morning crash in Limerick, and a motorcyclist lost his life in a collision in Gorey.

As the country's death toll climbed to over 224 so far this year, Mr Ahern said: "It is like all of the accidents, they are all horrific and they are all very sad stories for the families, for friends and for communities.

"And all we can continue to do is to urge people to show caution."

Mr Ahern said he was aware it was summer with a lot of traffic on the roads.

"I am conscious that there are two million vehicles out there every day and people just have to give themselves a bit more time, slow down a bit and just take it easy," he said.

The latest deaths also prompted one of the country's most vocal bishops to speak out, saying that simply accepting that the ongoing carnage was inevitable is not a Christian option.

"If each one of us takes more seriously our obligation to drive carefully, our obligation not to indulge in alcohol or other drugs when driving, our obligation to obey the rules of the road and not to ignore speed limits, then lives will be saved," the Bishop of Killaloe Dr Willie Walsh said.