Festive drink-driving 'doubles'

London experienced a massive festive surge in drink-driving as over-the-limit motorists were involved in more than 270 accidents on the capital's roads.

While the rest of England and Wales saw a marginal rise in drink-driving, the rate of positive breath tests over Christmas and New Year almost doubled in London.

A total of 276 drivers out of 1,761 breathalysed after road accidents in London tested positive - a rate of 15.6 per cent. The previous year, only 8.8 per cent of drivers failed breath tests after accidents. Nationally, figures produced by the Association of Chief Police Officers, showed positive breath tests up one per cent to eight per cent.

ACPO's road policing spokesman David Kenworthy, Chief Constable of North Yorkshire Police, said: "Despite considerable effort by Government, police and other partners in road safety, there remains a substantial core of drink-drive offenders willing to put their own and others lives at risk."

Motoring organisations were dismayed by the London figures. Edmond King, executive director of the RAC Foundation, said: "The worry is that drivers are becoming complacent. Our research shows young men, in particular, are ignorant about the amounts they can drink."

An RAC study revealed that many young male drivers believed they could drink three or four pints of lager without being over the limit.

ACPO said that the figures may have got worse this time because of a five per cent increase in accidents, partly due to bad weather. But the analysis fails in London, where the number of drink-drivers caught jumped dramatically even though the accident rate dropped sharply, from 2,103 in 1999-2000 to 1,761 this Christmas and New Year.

The RAC suggested the steep rise could be due to workers opting to drive instead of trying to find a black cab in the West End. Mr King said: "Over the Christmas period, there were widespread reports about how difficult it was to get a cab late at night." He said London may need a new campaign targeted at young men.