Drink-drive campaign reveals worrying trend

Their high-profile campaign will continue into the New Year.

But they say that by early in the campaign a disturbing trend had emerged with young drivers making up six of out ten testing positively for excess alcohol.

Police say their aims is further to reduce the number of people killed and seriously injured on Sussex

roads as a result of drivers being impaired by alcohol or drugs.

Figures for December are already showing an encouraging downward trend. During the same period in December last year, 10 people were killed on the roads of Sussex.

By today the figure stood at only three.

Serious injuries have also fallen to 14 compared with from 24 in 2006 and 30 in 2005.

Police believe the figures correspond with an increase in positive breath tests after intervention by the police PRIOR TO collisions occurring - a tactic they have been developing over recent months.

In the current campaign, 158 people have been arrested for providing a positive breath test, 10 of these relating to a collision.

Officers say this clearly shows that targeting of suspected drivers and locations before collisions occur reduces casualties.

Some 257 drivers have been breath tested following collisions and despite the encouraging figure of only 10 positive results a worrying trend has emerged.

Of the 10 drivers arrested, six fall into the young driver category of 17-25.

This figure is all the more worrying when this age group were only involved in 25% of recorded collisions.

Chief Inspector Mark Trimmer of the Roads Policing Unit reinforced the message of the campaign.

"It is very sad that the 17-25 year old age group are featuring highly in alcohol related collisions and we will robustly target this group of drivers to further reduce the number of casualties on our roads over Christmas and into the new year.

"We have checks planned at various times daily across Sussex throughout December and January. It is better not to drink at all than try and calculate what may be under the limit. "

We would encourage people who suspect drivers who are impaired through drink or drugs to contact us either directly on 0845 6070999, through Crimestoppers or using Operation Crackdown web site.