Road safety bill to be launched next week says Salvini

(ANSA) - ROME, JUN 16 - Transport Minister Matteo Salvini said Friday the government will next week present a road safety bill to clamp down on incidents such as Wednesday night's crash in Rome in which a five-year-old boy was killed by an SUV whose driver was allegedly taking part in a YouTube challenge with the other four occupants of the car.
    Salvini cited the case of five-year-old Manuel Proietti, whose mother and sister were seriously hurt in the collision between the SUV Lamborghini and the woman's Smart car.
    He also cited an overnight case of a driver who failed a drug and alcohol test after killing a boy on a zebra crossing at Volvera near Turin.
    Salvini said he had asked those framing the bill to crack down further on people using their phones while driving.
    "Within the next week we will bring, as promised, the road safety bill," Infrastructure Minister Salvini announced on the sidelines of an inspection of a construction site in Umbria.
    "Even tonight, someone found positive for alcohol and drugs killed a boy in a pedestrian zebra crossing, rather than five imbeciles who, in order to have a race, killed a five-year-old child, so there will be regulations of absolute severity," he added.
    "Since common sense is not enough,' Salvini stressed again, "people will have to be afraid, really afraid, to get behind the wheel drugged or drunk." He went on: "On mobile phones I have asked the traffic police for a special clampdown.
    "A large part of accidents comes from distraction and if I catch you chatting or using your mobile phone you stop. It's not that I fine you but you stop with the car there," he added.
    "We have also foreseen," Salvini further said, "that newly licensed drivers for the first three years cannot drive big cars because someone who has had his licence for one year if you put a Lamborghini, Porche or anything else in his hand it is not a smart thing to do. You will have to wait". (ANSA).