MADD Canada Publications - Taking back our roads

Taking Back Our Roads: A strategy to eliminate impaired driving in Canada is intended to provide the necessary context for a meaningful dialogue with the Federal Government on the legislative steps it must take to effectively address impaired driving in Canada.

Although Parliament reviewed the impaired driving legislation in 1999 and passed related Criminal Code amendments in 1999 and 2000, there are important issues that have not been addressed by our federal elected representatives and government officials. MADD Canada has published this comprehensive review of federal impaired driving legislation to prompt an immediate discussion on what must be done to combat the number one criminal cause of death in our country. The Federal Government has an essential role to play in this fight, and it must act now if Canadians are to see safer roads and an elimination of impaired driving crashes, injuries and deaths.

Taking Back Our Roads is a summary of a larger and on-going endeavour of more than 400 pages of research and background information. A team of MADD Canada researchers has been working on federal legislative matters off-and-on since 1998, and has been working intensively on this particular project for the past twelve months.

The initiatives in Taking Back Our Roads are supported by public opinion research confirming Canadians’ desire for new, effective approaches to fighting impaired driving. There is an overwhelming sense of injustice regarding the needless tragedy of alcohol-related crashes. In addition, research illustrates that Canadian laws have fallen behind the more progressive laws of comparable democratic countries. The public opinion and international research in Taking Back Our Roads help place our Canadian impaired driving policies and the proposed initiatives into context.

MADD Canada trusts this comprehensive study will prove to be a useful index of realistic measures to reduce impaired driving crashes and their resulting deaths and injuries. This document provides a snapshot of where Canada stands today compared to other countries - and how the Federal Government can improve its legislation to eliminate impaired driving. MADD Canada is presenting Taking Back Our Roads as a tool for the public, media, and particularly for legislators, who want to reduce impaired driving.

Taking Back Our Roads (PDF)