Transport Secretary rejects calls for lower drink-drive limit

The government has rejected the recommendations of Sir Peter North, commissioned by Whitehall to look into drink driving, and has decided to keep the current limit intact.

North had recommended that the drink-drive limit be cut from 80mg of alcohol per 100 mg of blood to 50mg, claiming that a cut would save over 300 lives within six years. However Transport Secretary Philip Hammond says that better enforcement of the current limit will prove to be just as effective.

Road safety campaigners, who have reacted with anger to the government’s decision, claim that one in six deaths on the nation’s roads are due to motorists driving under the influence, but Hammond says that the government will instead reinforce its commitment to take tougher action against drivers who “flagrantly ignore” the current limit and that the number of drink-driving deaths has already fallen by 75% since 1979.

The action that the government is already committed to includes giving traffic officers portable alcohol testing devices, while roadside drug testing kits are currently being tested by the Home Office and will be given to officers in the coming months. The government has also said that drivers who are only slightly above the drink-drive limit will lose the right to request a blood test.

Despite these measures, road safety campaigners have condemned the government for not acting on the advice of Sir Peter North. Julie Townsend, campaigns director of road safety charity Brake, called the decision “bitterly disappointing”. She called for zero-tolerance of drink-driving while the RAC said that, according to its own surveys, almost 90% of drivers said that they would support a lowering of the limit.