Impaired stats claimed deceiving
By Canadian Press
July 26, 2008

TORONTO -- The number of people being charged with impaired driving is dropping, but anti-drunk-driving advocates and some police say that's not because there are fewer impaired drivers on the road.

A CBC report says figures compiled by Statistics Canada show the number of people in Canada slapped with drunk-driving charges over the last 20 years has been cut in half.

The statistics -- gathered at the request of Mothers Against Drunk Driving Canada -- show the number of adults and youths charged with impaired operation of a motor vehicle with a blood alcohol content of 80 milligrams or more per 100 millilitres dropped from 117,514 in 1986 to 56,617 in 2006.

The number charged with impaired operation of a motor vehicle causing bodily harm declined from 1,239 to 812 during the same period.

Anti-drunk-driving advocates worry the number of drunk drivers is not dropping, but police are laying fewer charges due to problems with Canada's impaired driving laws.

Toronto police traffic Sgt. Tim Burrows said the amount of paperwork it takes to process a single impaired-driving charge can take an officer almost half a shift.

"There's more paperwork now. The level of expectation from the courts for what we need to put forward is a very, very high level because drinking and driving (charges) affect so many things," he said, including the accused's licence, insurance and employment status.

"It's made our job a lot harder in terms of the prosecution of that, the collection of evidence, and the time consumed to process an impaired or an over-80 charge," Burrows said.

Robert Solomon, a law professor at the University of Western Ontario who has crunched the Statistics Canada numbers for MADD, agrees the law is too cumbersome. As a result, he said, some police officers are laying lesser charges, such as roadside suspensions, in borderline impaired cases.