Road Safety: Motion Seanad Éireann — 2026-02-17 ============================================================ Linda Nelson Murray (FG), Industrial and Commercial Panel In November, I was invited by the Rotary Club of Navan to attend the Just 1 Life event, an event I know the Minister of State will go to, which is a powerful young driver awareness programme. Approximately 350 students filled the Solstice Arts Centre in Navan. The event featured deeply impactful presentations from An Garda Síochána, a roads policing sergeant, Dr. Ahmad Jamal, an on-call consultant at Our Lady's Hospital Navan and Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital, alongside a critical care nurse, ambulance call centre staff, members of the fire and rescue service and families who have experienced devastating loss caused by road traffic accidents. Nothing was softened. Nothing was held back. You could have heard a pin drop in that room. The silence spoke volumes about the shock, reflection and genuine desire among those students to understand the consequences of dangerous driving. The Rotary Club of Navan has delivered that programme to more than 3,000 students. It is extraordinary work, the importance of which cannot be overstated. Meath County Council has supported the Rotary Club of Navan in that initiative but, sitting there last November, I could not help but think this surely is something that should be embedded in every school across the country, as my colleague Senator Scahill said. If we are serious about achieving zero deaths on our roads, we must begin with our young people. Some of the statistics shared this evening are truly shocking. A total of 25% of people arriving in emergency departments with severe injuries from a road accident were not wearing a seatbelt. Of all road fatalities in Ireland, 27% involved individuals not wearing seatbelts. A total of 17% of people admit to not wearing a seatbelt in the back seat. Beyond seatbelts, we must confront the broader challenges. Speed continues to be a factor in too many collisions. Mobile phone use while behind the wheel is another factor. Many fatalities occur on rural roads that young people use daily to travel to school, training, work and social activities. Another issue is young people driving tractors with massive slurry tanks - surely there should be some form of training on that. One in four people killed on Irish roads is aged between 16 and 25. Young drivers aged 18 to 24 have the highest collision rates. The figures also show a stark gender imbalance. According to the Road Safety Authority, almost eight out of ten driver fatalities are male, as are six out of ten of those injured. Behind every statistic is a name. As Dr. Jamal so powerfully said on that day in November, this is not just about the person who dies but also the family left behind. Road safety is not simply about enforcement. It is about culture, responsibility and prevention. Volunteer organisations like the Rotary Club of Navan are doing remarkable work but life-saving education should not depend on volunteers alone. I welcome this Private Members' motion and I thank my colleagues for bringing it forward. If we truly believe in Vision Zero, we must treat road safety education as essential, not optional. Even one life lost on our roads is one too many. --- Source: Houses of the Oireachtas. Licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). The Official Report is revised after first publication; the fetch timestamp below identifies the version quoted. Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/seanad/2026-02-17/debate/main Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:54:38+00:00 Sitting date: 2026-02-17