Almost 15,000 penalty points were issued to drivers in Kerry last year.
That’s according to figures released by the Central Statistics Office.
The Transport Omnibus report 2021, shows a total of 216,551 penalty point endorsement notices were issued nationally.
The CSO’s Transport Omnibus 2021, shows that 14,988 penalty points were issued to drivers in Kerry last year. That’s a 17% reduction on 2020, when 17,951 penalty point notices were given to drivers in the county.
Nationally, there was a 9% increase in endorsements on licences, with 216,551 notices issued, up from 198,589 in 2020.
Two thirds of points issued last year were to males, with 128,690 points issued, while 64,895 females received penalty points. Meanwhile, no gender was recorded in 22,966 cases of driving demerit notices.
Speeding was the most common offence, with 161,299 penalty points issued nationally in 2021, a 10% increase on 2020.
Meanwhile, there were 22,152 penalty points issued for driving while holding a mobile phone, and there was a 37% year on year rise in points issued for driving with no insurance.
4,047 learner drivers unaccompanied by a qualified driver received points, a 32% increase from 2020, while there was a 24% rise in penalty points issued for careless driving, compared to the year before.
Elsewhere, there were 3,519 points issued for use of a vehicle without an NCT cert, a 9% drop year on year.
Meanwhile there was a 17% reduction on endorsement notices for adults failing to wear a seat belt in a category M1 vehicle (passenger vehicles with no more than eight seats), with 2,054 points issued last year, down from 2,468 on 2020.
