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During June, officers from the Met Police Traffic unit recorded an all time high in drink drive arrests. The Summer Drink Drive campaign, which ran between Mon 5 June 2006 and Wed 5 July 2006, showed a worrying trend amongst London’s drivers.
During this period the MPS Traffic unit officers made 169 drug and drink drive arrests in London alone, the most number of arrests from one Operational Command Unit.
Across the whole of the Metropolitan Police service statistics show that in the month of June there were
1446 arrests in total compared to 1409
for the month of June last year.
The increase in this these offences may be due to the World Cup, and the continuing warm weather this summer, where drivers may spend longer time socialising and drinking. Despite these possible factors this is a worrying trend and still a cause for great concern.
In order to combat the increase in drink drive and drug drive offences during the summer period, the MPS Traffic Unit are committed to ensuring that those persons breaking the law and putting lives in danger will be prosecuted.
Enforcement involves static vehicle checks whereby Traffic officers will slow the traffic flow to a crawl and individual vehicles will be selected and stopped by the side of the road for vehicle and driver checks. The driver will be given drink and drug drive advice and if alcohol or offences are suspected, the driver will be breath tested.
Traffic officers will be also continue to use their new powers and skills in drug-drive testing, known as Field Impairment Testing (FIT). Since training began in April 2005, 636 officers across the Met, have been trained in the ability to detect impairment through the use of drugs, and under new legislation drivers can be arrested for refusing to take the tests
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