The drink-drive limit on Scotland’s roads will being lowered in time for the festive season.
Justice Secretary Kenny MacAskill said yesterday that plans to cut the blood alcohol limit from 80mg in every 100ml of to 50mg would be in place from December 5.
The measure, if approved by the Scottish Parliament, would mean the legal alcohol limit being brought into line with that in most of Europe – but it would be lower than the one in force south of the border.
The Institute of Advanced Motorists claimed the move would not make the roads safer because most people who cause accidents were “blatantly blitzed”, not marginally over the limit.
And the Conservatives said the Scottish Government risked creating criminals out of ordinary, hard working people.
Mr MacAskill insisted the new limit would send a “clear message” to drivers who continue to ignore warnings that there is never an excuse for being over the limit.
He said about one in ten deaths on the roads involved drink drivers, who were three times more likely to be involved in a fatal car crash.
The announcement was backed by the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents and Chief Superintendent Iain Murray, head of road policing, who said: “There is no such thing as a ‘safe’ drink-drive limit.”
George Goldie, vice-president of the Institute of Advanced Motorists, said: I think it (lowering the limit) will increase the income for the local authorities and police, whoever gets the fines, but I do not think it will improve road safety.
“One in ten accidents are caused by drink driving, we have very few statistics, if any, to show how many accidents are caused by people who are marginally over the limit.
“Most accidents are caused by people who are blatantly blitzed.”
Tory transport spokesman Alex Johnstone, a north-east MSP, said the police should be targeting people who were three, four or even five times the legal limit.
“But with this move, the risk is police will stop chasing maniacs on a Saturday night who are inebriated behind the wheel, and instead target young mothers in supermarket car parks on Sunday mornings,” he added.
But Dave Thompson, SNP MSP for Skye, Lochaber and Badenoch, claimed it was “nonsense” to argue that the new limit would criminalise otherwise law abiding people.
“No one will be at risk of being criminalised if they separate drinking and driving,” he added.