Two amendments to Maltese drink driving legislation have been described as a step in the right direction, but leaves a lot more to be desired.

The two amendments have increased the penalty for anyone caught driving under the influence to €1,200 from €465 and anyone who refuses to take the test is automatically guilty of a crime. Sedqa’s Alcohol Services Division Coordinator Manel Mangani said that while this is an improvement, it is still way off the mark.

There is no need to elaborate. Malta is small enough for anyone who is out over the weekend to see, with their own eyes, the way many weekend revelers drive. People watch as groups of people leave a pub where they have been drinking alcohol and one of them proceeds to rev up the car and drive off for pastures new.

Those unfortunate to have an early start on Saturday and Sunday drive slowly and keep their eye out for drunkards making their way home, sometimes at breakneck speed, sometimes on the wrong side of the road.

All too often, we are greeted on a Saturday or Sunday morning with the news of a car having ploughed into pedestrians, stationary vehicles or other moving traffic. The results are often fatal.

The problem seems to be twofold. There is not enough police presence on the road while current legislation, although recently updated, does not allow the police enough clout in dealing with the problem.

There is also the third aspect, that is the legal limit in Malta (like the UK) is 80 milligrams of alcohol per deciliter of blood. This is higher than the European average which is 50 mg. Other countries are completely intolerant and any amount of alcohol in the blood is deemed too much when driving.

Maltese police have the right to ask someone to submit to a breathalyzer test only if they see that a person’s eyes are glazed, or if they can smell alcohol on their breath.

This is an amateurish and completely ineffective way of dealing with the problem.

Before the police are accorded the right to stop people randomly and/or hang around car parks to breathalyse people before they get into their car and drive off, then we are not going to get very far.

While many argue that we must stop people getting into their cars and driving while under the influence, the real solution is stopping people from wanting to drive while under the influence. This can be approached in many ways.

The first would be to increase fines even further. The second would be revoking an offenders licence for longer than the mandatory six months – two years sounds a lot more warranted. The police, as we have mentioned, must be allowed to conduct tests at any given time or location. They must also stop turning blind eyes to drunk motorists and book them, not tell them to pull over and sleep it off. These efforts must be backed up by a shock advertising campaign.

Although it is a British ad, most Maltese are familiar with the three lads drinking at a pub, and the long-legged blonde who becomes victim to a car wreck – transposed into the surroundings of the pub. Another is the bar tender who asks “what will it be”, and then changes voice to all the people who are affected when a drink-driving incident occurs. We must shock, we must hit hard and we must eliminate drink driving. Our current efforts fall way too short of the mark.