Christmas drink driving arrests down 66%

THERE was a drastic drop in the number of drink-driving arrests in Clare over the Christmas period.

Arrests for suspected drink-driving were down by over 66%, down from 17 in 2014 to five in 2015, according to figures from Clare Garda Traffic Corps.

There were also falls in the number of non-serious injury traffic incidents in the 12-day period, down from six in 2014 to two in 2015.

The number of material damage only traffic incidents also decreased from 34 over the Christmas period of 2014 to 23 in the same period last year.

There were no fatal traffic incidents in the holiday period for 2015 and 2014, as well as no serious injury incidents recorded.

Sergeant Darragh Molloy of Ennis Garda Traffic Corps stated, “The gardaí are very pleased with the figures for the recent Christmas period, showing a downward trend in road traffic accidents and drink-driving arrests. This is very welcome to see and is due to the enforcement on our roads by the Road Traffic Corps in County Clare.

“There were an increased number of gardaí and checkpoints throughout County Clare over the Christmas, starting our road safety campaign in early December and running right through until January 6. We were very pleased that there were no fatalities during this time, however there have been two fatalities in 2015 and that is two too many. We would be hopeful that this will go down in 2016.”

Jessica Quinn