Random breath tests: the new revenue raisers

We all know the feeling - you wake up after a big night on the town and have to head off to run some important errand. Maybe you stayed over at a mate’s place as all those anti-drink driving campaigns taght you to do. Maybe you got a cab home and need to pick up your car.

Whatever the reason, there’s a pretty good chance that you’ve driven a car while hungover. In fact, you may even still be over the limit - alcohol leaves your system at a rate of around 1 standard drink per hour, so if you had a superhuman night on the Bundy & Colas, you could well be pushing 0.05.

Driving along feeling sorry for yourself, you see flashing lights in front of you.

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If you’re over the limit, you could be in a whole world of trouble.

This current fad with morning after breath testing, most frequently noticed on the north shore of Sydney, is a blatant and cynical fundraising activity. In my driving career, I have been breath tested about five times at night. On a Sunday morning, I’ve probably been tested double that. Once, I encountered two RBTs in the same day.

Sure, driving while over the limit the next morning is still a crime, but where is the awareness campaign? We are bombarded with fear campaigns about driving home from the pub - images of flashing lights in your rearview mirror are splashed all over television, newspapers and bus shelters. But never once have I seen an advertisement telling me not to drive the next morning if I’m hungover.

And yet, time after time, the police set up RBTs on a Sunday morning. Do they know something that the guys in their awareness department don’t?

Drivers who do the right thing by sleeping at a mate’s place then driving home the next morning are being penalised every weekend. What happens to the money that is pouring into the State Government’s coffers from these fines? Will the public ever be educated on the dangers of driving the next morning?

For this law enforcement to be effective, you must first educate the public about the dangers of driving while hungover, and then penalise offenders. Without education, this exercise is simply another money grab, hitting the little guy in order to finance an inefficient bureaucracy.