Ireland South MEP Cynthia Ní Mhurchú has called for a get-tough approach to those who are caught doing excessive speeds on our rural roads.

The MEP has called for a greater concentration of speed vans at accident black spots and on the country’s rural roads where she says speeding is dramatically impacting road safety.

The EU Transport Committee MEP made her calls as Gardaí released figures to her showing that €32,437,002 has been collected in fines from Garda speed vans between January 2023, and June 8th, 2025.

Ní Mhurchú questioned why revenue from speed vans across all Garda districts fell by 15.9% between 2023 and 2024.

Garda figures released to Ní Mhurchu also show that Gardaí paid out over €44m euro to private speed camera operators between the start of 2023 and up to August 18th, 2025, meaning that the Garda speed van system is operating at an overall loss.

Waterford figures

Dublin and Tipperary were two of the highest grossing counties for the Garda speed vans in the period with Cork and Kildare following closely behind.

Waterford only took in €681,360 in Garda speed van fines in the period January 2023 to June 8th 2025.

This is lower than Wexford (€855,840) and considerably lower than Cork (€2,893,200).

Most of the fines were taken in Waterford city followed by the Tramore Garda district and then Dungarvan.

According to Ní Mhurchú, speeding caused the deaths of 52 Irish people in 2024.

“A European Commission report from 2020 estimated that 10 to 15% of all crashes and 30% of all fatal crashes are the direct result of speeding or inappropriate speed. 174 people died on Irish roads in 2024, which means that 52 of those people died as a direct result of speeding (30%). There are 52 families across the country mourning loved ones because we have failed to tackle speeding in any meaningful way,” she said.

Ní Mhurchú  welcomed an extra €9 million in funding for up to 100 new speed cameras to enhance road safety at the end of 2024 but said that continual investment in new technology is needed to catch those who are flouting the law.

Ní Mhurchú  has also called for smarter positioning of our current stock of speed vans to ensure they are located in areas of highest risk of road fatalities. She has also called for consideration of re-education courses as a judicial sanction for drivers who are repeatedly caught speeding.

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