MADD Calgary endorses potential lowering of blood-alcohol limit

MADD Calgary is hopeful the federal government will follow through on the idea of lowering the legal blood alcohol limit for drivers.

Earlier this week, Justice Minister Jody Wilson-Raybould said she’ll be speaking with her provincial counterparts about lowering the limit from 0.08 to 0.05 per cent.

Denise Dubyk with the Calgary chapter of Mothers Against Drunk Driving says they’ve been pushing for this change since the mid-90s.

She cites research showing that at 0.08 the chances of crash fatalities and injuries go up three times.

“So lowering it to 0.05 is going to make a huge reduction,” she says.

Wilson-Raybould also referenced new research as one of the reasons she’s looking into the change.

Dubyk says that the 0.05 limit should lead to even less people getting behind the wheel after drinking, but she expects that there will be a lot of opposition to the idea, as there has been before.

“It’s going to be something that across the country people will be saying: ‘Why do we have to do that? What’s the difference it’s going to make? We’re going to lose money in our businesses'”.

She says that kind of pushback has long kept the government from looking into a change.

“I think at some point along the line, the government just decided they weren’t going to look into this part of it.”

Alberta’s Minister of Justice, Kathleen Ganley, said in a statement that the provincial government will look into the issue.

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