Results of festive drink drive campaign

During the final week of the annual ACPOS Festive Drink Drug Drive Campaign, police officers across Scotland have detected 131 offenders who were driving whilst over the legal alcohol limit. In addition a further seven offenders were detected for driving whilst under the influence of drugs and three offenders were detected whilst under the influence of alcohol.

This is an overall increase compared with the final week of last year’s campaign, in which 105 drink drivers were caught and a further four were caught driving while unfit through drugs.

In total, over the four week period 478 offenders were caught driving whilst over the legal alcohol limit, 36 offenders were detected for driving whilst under the influence of drugs and eleven offenders were reported for driving whilst impaired through alcohol. This is an overall increase compared to last year’s campaign, which saw 426 drink drivers caught and a further 25 who were found to be unfit through drugs and one who was unfit through alcohol.

During this year’s campaign, the vehicle forfeiture scheme was extended to include first time offenders who provided a high reading or who refused to provide a sample for analysis. Over the campaign ten repeat offenders were detected, 51 offenders provided a high reading and 43 offenders refused to provide a sample. In total, the courts have been asked to give consideration to seizing 104 vehicles from these offenders.