Spain to introduce pedestrian breath tests?

IF you have a drink too many and decide to walk home, be careful as proposed new regulations mean you might face a breath test.

And you could get reprimanded for speeding as well if you can manage to stagger at a faster pace than ‘a normal stride.’

Spain’s traffic department, the DGT has in a report proposed new “tools to foster better relations and coexistence between pedestrians, cyclists, motorists and vehicles.”

While proposals for higher drink driving fines and better regulation of driving schools are probably not too controversial, the plans hidden away in the report to give alcohol and drug tests to pedestrians involved in traffic accidents or offences are more contentious.

Now Spanish government advisory body, the Council for State, has queried the proposals in a report, said Europa Press.

The council is worried that it is a step too far that would restrict the freedom and invade the privacy of people as they go about their daily life.

The proposal to restrict the speed of pedestrians to a normal stride could even amount to a ban on jogging if police enforce the proposed laws in an overzealous manner.

But the DGT has said that there is nothing new in the alcohol test proposals, spokesperson Maria Segui Gomez explaining that municipal police, “have been carrying out these tests for months – there is nothing new here that will allow us to start sanctioning pedestrians, whether with fines or penalty points.”

She added that in 2014 more than half the 370 pedestrians killed on Spanish roads had alcohol or drugs in their blood.

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