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We're a nation that ignores the health and safety levels of our tyres, and we're not being punished enough for it. That's the view of Continental Tyres, which has noted a sharp drop off in the number of penalty point notices being handed down for worn or unsafe tyres since legislation was introduced in 2016.
Commenting on the figures, Tom Dennigan of German tyre manufacturer, Continental Tyres Ireland, said: "In common with road safety campaigners across the country, we welcomed the introduction in May last year by the then Minister for Transport of the new tyre safety penalty point regime. However, with only a total of 853 notices issued for tyre offences in that year, we have to say that we are very disappointed with the extremely low level of enforcement in this regard. When you consider that a vehicle's tyres are the only contact point with the road, their importance to overall road safety can not be overestimated."
That figure of 853 stands in stark contrast to the 27,755 penalty point notices handed out for use of a mobile phone behind the wheel. "We can all see that mobile phone use behind the wheel is very widespread and we rightly welcome the Garda's focus on enforcement in this area, but equally, our own analysis of replacement tyres at tyre depots around the country has shown that vehicles running on dangerous or illegal tyres are extremely common. We would therefore have expected the number of tyre-related penalty point notices to be much higher than the recorded figure" said Mr Dennigan.
Continental's own research, which includes investigating tyres taken from cars which, minutes earlier, had been used on the road, indicates a worryingly high percentage with wear below the minimum 1.6mm limit, with bulges or even holes, or with uneven wear.
"Even to the untrained eye, the faults on these tyres were immediately apparent but the only way we can tackle this problem is with more stringent enforcement of the new regulations. We fully support the Garda in their work aimed at keeping our roads safe and we understand the serious manpower challenges that the force faces in doing their day-to-day work. However, we are not calling for a whole new programme of roadside checks aimed at tyre safety. We would suggest that a vehicle's tyres could be easily and quickly checked by a Garda when checking for perhaps, road tax / insurance or indeed, breathalyser tests for alcohol or other drugs. Our sole motivation is to ensure the worst examples of bad tyres that we uncovered are kept off our roads, that would be a huge boost to road safety across the country," commented Mr Dennigan.
'We can't put all of the onus on the Gardai, it is the responsibility of every motorist to ensure their vehicle is roadworthy and safe, and the condition of a vehicle's tyres are hugely important in this regard. Motorists should carry out regular checks of their tyres, looking out for any damage, cuts or bulges. If any of the tyres are showing signs of damage, the motorist should waste no time in having them checked out by a competent tyre fitter."