Overall Impaired Driving Cases Continue to Decline – Stats Canada
Prince George, B.C.- The number of impaired driving cases in Canada slipped last year, and is now 65% lower than it was in 1986. That’s according to the latest survey published by Stats Canada.
But while incidents of alcohol impairment have steadily declined, the number of drug impaired cases has been on the rise since 2009, doubling from 2% in 2009 to 4% last year.
Nationwide, there were 201 impaired driving ( alcohol and drug) incidents per 100 thousand population last year, compared to 577 per 100 thousand in ’86.
The stats are a little different when it comes to B.C.
In this province, the stats indicate there were 249 impaired incidents per 100 thousand population. While most involved alcohol (11,652 cases) nearly 400 involved drug impairment.
The highest police reported impaired driving rate is in Saskatchewan which had a rate of 575 incidents per 100 thousand population.
Other highlights of the report:
- one in 6 accused of impaired driving last year had been accused of the same crime in the previous decade
- impaired driving rates are lower in metropolitan areas
- almost half of all impaired driving incidents took place between 11 pm and 4 a.m.
- While most of those charged with impaired driving are male (80%) the proportion of females has increased since 1986 when just 8% of those charged were female.
- impaired driving rate is highest among drivers aged 20 – 24
The numbers of impaired driving incidents in Prince George for last year are not available, but Stats Canada’s report indicates that among B.C. communities examined, Kelowna has the highest rate per 100 thousand population at 323, followed by Victoria at 271 per 100 thousand, then Abbotsford-Mission at 218/100,000 and Vancouver at 164/100,000.
Comments
Stats are deceiving. Does this Impaired driving statistic include Immediate Roadside Prohibitions, which are not Criminal code investigations?
Good point. And, does this represent a true decline, or does it represent less enforcement.
One could say that all traffic offenses are down, but in reality, police enforcement is down, traffic offenses if anything, are up.
Our resident Abbotsfordian needs to move away from the chaos of impaired drivers. One out of every 500 people driving down there is impaired by drugs or alcohol.
Abby makes the top ten list for impaired drivers in Canada.
Just means there’s less policemen on the road.
Not necessarily. Detachments are getting more members each year. With IRP’s being more efficient and less time consuming than an impaired investigation…I will bet those are up.
Pretty much worthless unless correlated with number of enforcement hours. I remember what driving was like back in ’86, you couldn’t drive 10 minutes in this town without seeing at least one cruiser on patrol. Now I barely see one a month.
Less enforcement = less reported incidences. There are probably other factors affecting the numbers, but to say there is less drinking and driving period isn’t credible with these kinds of statistics.
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