I welcome the publication of the National Safety Camera Strategy. I fully support fixed speed cameras, average-speed cameras and bus lane enforcement because, without the infrastructure upgrades we desperately need, our public transport system is stuck. The core bus corridor for Dublin West remains tied up in legal challenges. Until that changes, our buses will continue to crawl through congestion at 12 km/h or 15 km/h, which is roughly the speed of a race walker. That is not a modern transport system. Bus lane enforcement matters. It is an essential short-term deterrent while we wait for long-term infrastructure delivery. If I am honest, my contribution today will probably be defined by welcoming progress while being frustrated at the pace of change. This strategy outlines structures for the management of speeding enforcement, red light cameras, bus lane cameras and the future enforcement of offences such as mobile phone use and seatbelt violations. My question is simple. Why does progress take as long as it does? Road deaths are at their highest level in a decade. Many of the same agencies that will sit on this camera enforcement oversight group already sit on the road safety leadership group. This raises questions as to why co-ordination takes so long. I am not just referring to the camera strategy but changes in respect of road safety in general. How effectively are the stakeholders working together? Ambition matters too. The strategy itself states that average-speed cameras reduce collisions resulting in fatalities or serious injuries by 56% while fixed cameras reduce such collisions by 15%. If we know they work, why move cautiously? We currently have just nine fixed speed cameras and three average-speed cameras nationwide. That is obviously not enough. It is concerning that the strategy seems to talk itself out of expansion because of what it calls "downstream impacts". It suggests that too many offences might overwhelm the courts system. After identifying the benefits of cameras, it states that they should not operate 24 hours a day, that signage is an effective deterrent and that drivers will not know which buses carry the technology. Surely the answer is not to limit enforcement. The answer is to fix the system. Let us be honest about what is happening. A major reason people challenge fixed-charge notices in court is to avoid penalty points. Too often, they succeed because there are weaknesses in how offences are matched to driver numbers on the national driver and vehicle file. According to a Department of Transport review, approximately 1,500 people a year are getting away without any points being recorded. That is the problem we should be urgently solving. If we capture the driver number earlier in the process, ensure penalty points follow convictions properly and make it absolutely clear that offenders will not evade consequences, compliance rates will rise quickly. Prioritising downstream constraints instead of fixing the root problems is not the right approach. Investing in court capacity, judges, clerks, registrars and digital integration is the right approach. I absolutely agree with the strategy that we must digitise documents, share information in real time and free gardaí from unnecessary court attendance. That work does not need a camera strategy to begin. We know this work requires as much urgency as we can possibly bring to it. I know genuinely great work is happening but our road traffic incident numbers are higher than they should be. We must tackle that issue with every tool at our disposal. We are not just here to manage problems; we are here to solve them.

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