National Vehicle and Driver File, Road Traffic and Roads Bill 2026: Second Stage Dail Éireann — 2026-09-17 ============================================================ Mark Ward (SF), Dublin Mid-West I welcome the opportunity to speak on road safety. It is an issue and concern for so many people. We have seen the recent horrific incidents on the M50 and the M9. Such is the fear in this regard that we have had reports since then of 75,000 fewer people taking the motorways in recent weeks. I too am a member of the justice committee. This week, we heard from members of An Garda Síochána. They confirmed to us that there is not one garda in the State, as I speak here today, who is trained in pursuit. If I know this, and we all know this, we had better believe that criminals out there know this too. It is 2026, and not one garda in the State is trained to pursue a vehicle that drives away at speed or refuses to stop. This is absolutely shocking. Any member of the public I have spoken to during the last couple of weeks, since this information got out, has found this unbelievable. People want to know, and it is a legitimate question, how this has been allowed to happen. I spoke at another debate yesterday. At that same meeting, a member of the Association of Garda Sergeants and Inspectors, AGSI, brought out a document from 1988 that said gardaí were going to get pursuit training. It has not happened. That is 38 years ago. I think I used the analogy of 1988 being the year in which Ray Houghton stuck the ball in the England net, and we still do not have a garda trained to pursue any fleeing vehicle. There is also the issue of e-scooters and scramblers being used to terrorise people on our streets. The Government brought in legislation to tackle the use of scramblers after the tragic death of Grace Lynch, yet people in my community, and in communities across Dublin and across Ireland, will tell you they have not seen any change. Gardaí need to be trained and resourced to tackle this problem. Gardaí cannot safely intervene if doing so is a danger to the public, but it is also a danger to the gardaí if they have not received the proper training. We have been telling the Government from this side of the House for years, for decades, that there has been a problem with scramblers, yet it took the death of a beautiful young girl for the Government to act. It is being reactive again to a situation and not proactive. The Government also brought in regulations in relation to e-scooters to deal with the number of young people suffering from acquired brain injuries but it was another reactive response. We have been telling the Government for a long time that this has been a problem in our communities. What we heard this week in the justice committee was shocking, coming from the Garda itself. It told us we will see an increase in the number of people having scramblers and e-scooters taken off them or being prosecuted for either not wearing high-vis clothing or a helmet. It told us they are the people probably using them in a legitimate way, going to work or for legitimate business. They are the people who will feel the full weight of this law because they might have forgotten their helmet or high-vis. This is because, generally, these people are compliant and law abiding so if a garda asks them to stop, they will, but the lads running amok in my community and others across Dublin using e-scoters for drug dealing or intimidation will not stop; they will flee. The problem then is the gardaí do not have the training to then pursue them. It is a catch-22. The Minister said in relation to pursuit training that the Government would make it a priority to get gardaí trained. We heard at the justice committee this week - if the Minister of State gets a chance, he should listen back or read the transcript - that by the end of this year, despite the urgency, only six gardaí will have the proper training. Another issue in the news this week involved a high-profile English football player who was arrested for dangerous driving and possession of nitrous oxide. I have raised this before. I have heard anecdotally from people contacting me that this is an issue in our areas. Young people have been seen driving around with balloons, which contain nitrous oxide. It is a dangerous situation. Anybody doing this is reckless and they need to stop. I said at the time we need to bring in roadside testing for nitrous oxide so if someone is under the influence of nitrous oxide, a roadside test can be undertaken. That might deter people from taking nitrous oxide and driving. We do not need a situation where we name another law after another fatality. We have a chance to bring in this testing. I urge the Minister of State to have a look at that. --- 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/2026-09-17/debate/main Retrieved: 2026-09-28T05:50:48+00:00 Sitting date: 2026-09-17