OPP alarmed by recent spike in impaired driving charges in GTA

WATCH ABOVE: Provincial cops say amount of charges over last 30 days up 60 per cent from same period in 2014. Mark Carcasole reports. 

TORONTO — In recent years, with the growth of mobile smart devices, distracted driving has become the hot safety topic on Ontario’s roads. But a trend spotted by the OPP’s Highway Safety Division clearly shows that the issue of drunk driving hasn’t gone anywhere.

Provincial police say they have filed more than 180 impaired driving-related charges on GTA highways over the last 30 days. That is a 60 per cent spike compared to the same 30-day period in 2014.

“Some of the people that we’ve charged over the last 30 days have registered upwards of three and four times the legal limit,” says OPP Sgt. Kerry Schmidt.

Tweet This Click to share quote on Twitter: "Some of the people that we've charged over the last 30 days have registered upwards of three and four times the legal limit," says OPP Sgt. Kerry Schmidt.

He says there is no key demographic.  They have charged males and females, younger and more experienced drivers. Worst of all, Schmidt says there’s no particular cause police can pinpoint and target.

Highways aren’t the only place impaired driving charges have jumped.

READ MORE: Impaired driver pulls over, calls cops on himself

We asked every municipal police force in the GTA for recent numbers — here’s what we found from those who provided them:

Toronto Police provided numbers to cover the same 30-day stretch monitored by the OPP, reporting 118 charges in 2015, compared to 111 in 2014. A six per cent rise.

Peel and York Regional Police provided their statistics year-to date.

Peel reported a decrease of over three per cent. From January 1 to May 10 of this year they laid 751 impaired driving-related charges. That’s down from 780 through that stretch last year.

It’s been a busy start to the year for police in York, though. They’ve laid 1,452 such charges since the start of this year, compared to 1,211 through the same span last year; reporting a 20 per cent spike.

“We need to make (drunk driving) socially unacceptable,” says Sgt. Schmidt.

For years public service ads have implored audiences not to drink and drive; but still there are those who aren’t convinced.

There has been a form of public shaming in recent years to try to deter the bad behaviour.

For several years now Durham Regional Police have been posting the names of people charged during their holiday season RIDE campaign on their website for all to see.  The practice has its critics, but Sgt. Bill Calder says it’s a deterrent.

“It’s also…a tool in our toolbox that says if you’re charged, it’s not an acceptable charge. Your name is going to be out there.”

Tweet This Click to share quote on Twitter: "It's also…a tool in our toolbox that says if you're charged, it's not an acceptable charge. Your name is going to be out there."

Hearing the latest numbers from around the GTA, MADD Canada Spokesperson Carolyn Swinson was taken aback. She hopes the rising numbers are caused by more offenders actually being caught, than an uptick in people drinking and driving.

Swinson proposes more government legislation to increase the odds further. Specifically, she and others from MADD have pitched the federal government on the idea of mandatory alcohol screening at RIDE checks. Swinson says it has been “very successful” in Australia and Ireland.

“Right now they need somebody to say they’ve been drinking or the smell of alcohol (to do a breathalyzer test),” says Swinson.

“(Mandatory screening) would mean they’d probably take X number of cars, say the first 20 cars in that RIDE spot check, they would administer a roadside breath test to every single one of those drivers.”

Swinson says they’ve taken the proposal directly to the federal government as they’d prefer a nation-wide rollout over sporadic ones in various provinces. So far, they say they haven’t received much of a reply.

No one can predict whether the recent spike in GTA charges is a short-term blip or a problem that will continue long-term.

Province-wide, the OPP say there have been 50 per cent fewer impaired driving-related deaths on highways across Ontario so far this year compared to this time last year. They only hope they can can keep that number down as we head toward the May long weekend; encouraging anyone who spots a driver they believe is impaired to call police immediately.

“We can’t be everywhere all the time,” says Sgt. Schmidt.