Road Traffic Accidents Dail Éireann — 2026-02-26 ============================================================ Jerry Buttimer (FG), Cork South-Central We have seen an incredible loss of life this week and in the past number of years on our roads and our thoughts this morning are with the people who have died and were injured and the families. Everything we say is couched in that tragedy and loss of life, and I thank Deputy Whitmore for her very important question. The Government has, as the Deputy will be aware, prioritised phase 2 of Vision Zero. The Government's current road safety strategy has the target of halving deaths and serious injuries on our roads this decade, or no more than 72 deaths by 2030. Achieving this reduction based on an annual straight-line projection, the phase 1 action plan published in 2021 noted that deaths in 2024 would have had to be no higher than 122. Regrettably, we saw 171 road deaths in 2024. Any death on our roads is one too many and behind that death is a family, a loved one, a friend and a community where lives are being irreparably damaged by the loss of a loved one. Obviously, we are all working collectively and collaboratively to ensure that our roads are safer. Think of the people who have life-altering injuries from a road traffic collision. For these reasons, the only acceptable long-term target for road deaths and injuries is Vision Zero, and the Government remains committed to this goal. Achieving our 2030 target will require even greater efforts and a steeper rate of decline during phases 2 and 3. It is imperative that we address the upward trend of recent years in the first instance and, in that context, the Minister of State, Deputy Canney, the Minister, Deputy O'Brien, and I do not believe it would be helpful to set a specific target for next year when we already have a clear objective for 2030. A range of important work is already under way across a variety of bodies and stakeholders to restore our long-term road safety progress, and we made huge progress on our annual road deaths, which saw a significant fall. --- 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/dail/2026-02-26/debate/main Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:54:42+00:00 Sitting date: 2026-02-26