After two rounds of voting on June 3, less than 50% of the Vietnamese parliament deputies support a ban on using alcoholic drinks while driving.Only 240/417 participants or 49.59% of the deputies at the National Assembly said yes to banning those found with alcohol content in their blood or breath from driving on the streets.
A Mercedes car of the drunk driver is damaged after the fatal crash killed 2 women in Hanoi on April 30. Photo: V.H
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With a 72.53% vote, they gave the nod to a proposed time frame for advertising liquor on television and radio. The proposed provision would ban advertisements of alcoholic drinks from 6pm to 9pm and immediately before, during and right after programs for children.
On June 3, the delegates had to give their views on two legislative options: 1/ whether driver with any alcoholic content in blood would be forbidden to drive and 2/ driver with the permissible alcoholic content in blood is allowed to drive.
The disapproval has striggered outrage from the public and NA deputies. Deputy Nguyen Thanh Hien from Nghe an pointed out that the ban on the use of alcoholic beverage when driving in many countries has been in place for a long time, even the driver does not cause an accident, but the driver is severely punished if he is found with alcohol in blood. He stressed that the important issue is to prevent alcoholic beverage abuse, protect people’s lives and property.
Deputy Tran Thi Thu Trang, deputy director of the Legal Department under Ministry of Health, said that the tax rate of alcoholic beverage in Vietnam is only about 30% of the retail price, while that in other countries is 48-85%.
Trang added that worries about losing taxes once tightening the law are not reasonable because taxes collected from alcohol products are inferior to alcohol-related losses in health, traffic accidents, among others.
As the bill is nearing its approval, it is losing its rigor compared to the original draft, Trang stressed.
At the interpellation session on June 4, NA Chairwoman Nguyen Thi Kim Ngan stressed that there was still discrepancy about the draft law on fighting the negative impacts of spirits, especially the provisions on drunk driving so it needs further study and consideration. The chairwoman regretted that the public opinion misunderstood the NA’s voting.
For his part, Deputy Prime Minister Truong Hoa Binh said that the whole society has seen the danger of drinking and driving. He affirmed that Vietnam has all legal instruments to deal with drunk-driving such as the Law on Road Traffic, but the NA will amend Decree 46 to impose stricter penalties on drunk drivers.
The Directorate for Roads of Vietnam under the Ministry of Transport has requested to draft amendments to Decree 46 on administrative penalties for road and railway traffic offenses, towards increasing penalties for drivers with alcohol content in blood or breath exceeding the permitted levels. Thus, civil servants were required to avoid drinking alcohol when driving and those driving under the influence would be strictly penalized.
In early April, at the meeting to review the implementation of Decree 46, the drafters proposed to amend the law on administrative penalties, including striping off driving licenses permanently for those driving under the influence and raising the maximum fine in road traffic violations to VND80 million (USD$3,430).
Alcoholic beverages, especially beer, is widely consumed in Vietnam. According to the Vietnamese government’s reports, Vietnam consumes on average 4.1 billion liters of beer and 305 million liters of alcohol in 2017, ranking among the tenth largest beer consumers in Asia and second in Southeast Asia.
Besides, the use of alcohol costs Vietnam at least VND65 trillion (US$2.82 billion) to fix consequences of alcohol consumption, including treating alcohol-related diseases.
Recently, local media quoted Minister of Transport Nguyen Van The as saying that his ministry requested relevant units to strengthen inspection and consider more severe punishments against drunk drivers after a series of alcohol-related traffic accidents have caused widespread public anger.
