It Peaked in 1981
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ARCHIVED - Archiving Content ARCHIVÉE - Contenu archivé Archived Content Contenu archivé Information identified as archived is provided for L’information dont il est indiqué qu’elle est archivée reference, research or recordkeeping purposes. It est fournie à des fins de référence, de recherche is not subject to the Government of Canada Web ou de tenue de documents. Elle n’est pas Standards and has not been altered or updated assujettie aux normes Web du gouvernement du since it was archived. Please contact us to request Canada et elle n’a pas été modifiée ou mise à jour a format other than those available. depuis son archivage. Pour obtenir cette information dans un autre format, veuillez communiquer avec nous. This document is archival in nature and is intended Le présent document a une valeur archivistique et for those who wish to consult archival documents fait partie des documents d’archives rendus made available from the collection of Public Safety disponibles par Sécurité publique Canada à ceux Canada. qui souhaitent consulter ces documents issus de sa collection. Some of these documents are available in only one official language. Translation, to be provided Certains de ces documents ne sont disponibles by Public Safety Canada, is available upon que dans une langue officielle. Sécurité publique request. Canada fournira une traduction sur demande. Statistics Canada – Catalogue no. 85-002-XIE, Vol. 23, no. 9 IMPAIRED DRIVING AND OTHER TRAFFIC OFFENCES - 2002 by Derek Janhevich, Maire Gannon, and Nicolas Morisset Highlights • In 2002, the rate of police-reported impaired driving incidents decreased by 4% after a slight increase in 2001. This drop is consistent with the general decrease over the last twenty years. The 2002 rate is 65% lower than the peak in 1981. • The downward trend since 1981 may be attributable to a number of factors, including changing attitudes with respect to impaired driving, aging of the general population, as well as other enforcement procedures used by the police such as roadside suspensions. • Among provinces, the rate of persons charged with impaired driving ranged from 183 per 100,000 persons aged 16 and older in Newfoundland and Labrador to 618 in Saskatchewan. • With the exception of Quebec which reported no change in the rate of persons charged with impaired driving, all provinces and territories reported decreases in 2002. Among provinces, Newfoundland and Labrador had the largest decrease (-19%) followed by New Brunswick (-12%) and Saskatchewan (-11%). • The rate of persons accused of impaired driving offences was highest among young adults between the ages of 19 and 24 and lowest for those 65 and over. • The rate of overall Criminal Code traffic incidents that involved fatalities or bodily harm has generally declined over the past 15 years. • Almost three-quarters (73%) of court cases involving impaired driving resulted in a conviction and of these 14% were sentenced to custody. Ordering and subscription information Introduction All prices exclude sales tax The time spent in automobiles has increased substantially in recent years. According This product, Catalogue no. 85-002-XPE, to Statistics Canada’s 1998 General Social Survey on Time Use, on an average is published as a standard printed weekday, Canadians spent 6 more minutes travelling by car than they did in 1986 publication at a price of CDN $11.00 per (Clark, 2000). In Canada, the average number of kilometres traveled during the week issue and CDN $100.00 for a one-year to go to work and return home rose from 85 km in 1986 to 100 km in 1998. Since subscription. cities are expanding, a larger proportion of people are living in suburbs and further ISSN 0715-271X from their workplace. People are spending much of their time in their personal vehicle, The following additional shipping charges whether to go to work, to access leisure activities, or for personal needs. Additionally, 1 apply for delivery outside Canada: according to the most recent data from the Canadian Vehicle Survey, there were approximately 18.3 million road vehicles in 2002, compared with 17.6 in 1999. Single Annual issue subscription This Juristat will analyze trends in impaired driving and other traffic offences under United States CDN $ 6.00 CDN $ 78.00 the Criminal Code. Points that may be useful in analyzing trends include new legislation Other countries CDN $ 10.00 CDN $ 130.00 on impaired driving; identification of variables that may be contributing to the general This product is also available in electronic decline; and a brief examination of dangerous driving. format on the Statistics Canada Internet site as Catalogue no. 85-002-XIE at a price of CDN $9.00 per issue and CDN $75.00 for a one-year subscription. To obtain single Police-reported statistics on impaired driving issues or to subscribe, visit our Web site at www.statcan.ca, and select Products and A number of organizations and institutes have been collecting information on impaired Services. driving over time; however the methodologies employed are somewhat different and ISSN 1209-6393 therefore results differ as well (see text box “Different Methods of Data Collection”). November 2003 Published by authority of the Minister Different Methods of Data Collection responsible for Statistics Canada. A number of data sources exist on impaired driving and other traffic offences, and they all have strengths © Minister of Industry, 2003 and limitations. For a more detailed description of these sources of data, refer to the Methodology and Data Sources section of this Juristat. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a Canadian Centre for Justice Statistics (CCJS) – The CCJS collects information provided by the police retrieval system or transmitted in any form as well as provincial adult courts. Police data on impaired driving and other Criminal Code traffic violations or by any means, electronic, mechanical, reflect those incidents and charges that come to the attention of the police. These data are subject to photocopying, recording or otherwise police operational and discretionary practices. The CCJS does not collect information on police-reported without prior written permission from vehicle accidents, unless they are reported by the police as Criminal Code traffic violations. Court statistics Licence Services, Marketing Division, reflect the number of cases involving a Criminal Code traffic violation that are processed through adult Statistics Canada, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada provincial criminal courts. It will not necessarily include all those cases that were processed by the police K1A 0T6. because of time lags, changes in the type of charge, and/or dropping of charges. As a result, the number of police incidents or charges and the number of cases appearing in court will not match. Note of appreciation Traffic Injury Research Foundation (TIRF) – The Foundation maintains a database on fatal accidents in Canada involving drivers, passengers and pedestrians since 1987. The data come from two information Canada owes the success of its statistical sources: police reports on accidents, and reports of coroners and medical examiners from all provinces. system to a long-standing partnership With respect to police data on accidents, most jurisdictions collect data on traffic crash frequencies from between Statistics Canada, the citizens police reports. For an accident to be included in these counts, at least three things must happen: the of Canada, its businesses and governments. accident must be reported to the police; the police must attend the accident; and a report must be written. Accurate and timely statistical information Coroner data only include the sub-set of crashes that involve fatalities. Coroner data can suffer from the could not be produced without their time lag between the actual death and the time the cause of death is determined and entered into a central continued cooperation and goodwill. data set, resulting in a lag in fatality count. Transport Canada – The data, collected in co-operation with the Canadian Council of Motor Transport Standards of service to the public Administrators, include persons who died in connection with the death of an impaired driver. Often TIRF Statistics Canada is committed to serving its works in partnership with Transport Canada. clients in a prompt, reliable and courteous manner and in the official language of their Mothers Against Drunk Drivers (MADD) Canada – This organization’s data reflect not only drivers but choice. To this end, the agency has also passengers who are under the influence of alcohol. Even if the driver has not consumed alcohol, developed standards of service which its intoxicated passengers are included in the statistics produced by MADD. If an intoxicated driver kills third employees observe in serving its clients. party road users but he/she does not die, the victims will be included in the overall death statistics. To obtain a copy of these service standards, please contact your nearest Statistics Canada Regional Reference Centre. This Juristat will focus on police-reported impaired driving statistics, which refer to The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American (1) incidents known to and substantiated by police and (2) persons charged with national Standard for Information Sciences impaired driving. National-level analysis is based on these data. – Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI Z39.48 – 1984. ∞ 1 The available information dates only from 1999, since the data collection method has changed. It is not possible to compare the data with those for previous years. 2 Statistics Canada – Catalogue no. 85-002, Vol. 23, no. 9 It should be noted that revisions have been made to the number taken on a number of fronts including the introduction of of actual impaired driving incidents for the RCMP in 2000 and provincial/territorial legislation related to impaired driving, with 2001. These revisions resulted in a 6% reduction in actual such provisions as ignition interlock programs and vehicle incidents at the Canada level for 2000 and 9% for 2001, but forfeiture.