Monday, July 03, 2006

Las Noticias de tráfico

The first part of the story is encouraging.

From CanariasAhora.com 2 July

15 people die on the first weekend of the summer holidays. Although this is ten less than the same weekend last year when 25 people lost their lives on Spanish roads. It appears that the high number of drivers having points deducted from their licences has had a deterrent effect this year.

In Cataluña the Mossos d'Esquadra have deducted 1,861 points from drivers licences in the first 24 hours of the new regime. This involved 514 reports and four drivers have lost their licences. One of these lost a total of 16 points (he, like all other drivers started with 12 points) for incorrect manoevres, excess alcohol, not wearing a seatbelt and driving without a licence.

In Galicia yesterday, a total of 234 drivers (only 11 women) lost a total of 863 points, mainly for excess alcohol.

In Asturias 61 drivers lost a total of 250 points and excess alcohol was gain the principal cause (opver 50%).

In Cuidad Real a total of 26 drivers, all male, six of whom were under 25 lost a total of 112 points, again excess alcohol the principal cause.

If I seem to be harping on about the subject, I make no apologies. If the little extra publicity from this blog helps in some way to make the Spanish come to terms with the stupidity shown by such large numbers of drivers, and this in turn helps to save lives, then it's worth making myself unpopular.

Just remember for every drunk driver caught, there are probably another 100 out there who didn't get caught this time. In other words there were probably over 50,000 drunk drivers out there on Spanish roads this weekend!

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