DRINKING and driving is an emotive issue, especially when you have been at the 'dead end' of these selfish motorists.

I am a retired police sergeant and I applaud the officers who manned all the checkpoints over Christmas and New Year. They are dedicated people, working against a system whereby their department - Traffic - has been systematically decimated by management, who saw it as elitist and egotistical.

Traffic men and women were proud of their department and stature in the police culture. But before John Blunt (LET, January 13) hands out such criticism of these officers and their work, he should visit relatives of innocent victims - mums, dads, daughters, sons, etc - who have to live with drink-driving for the rest of their lives.

Many millions of cars, whose owners either live in Lancashire or were passing through, will have been on the county's roads over Christmas and New Year and just one life saved by these stop checks makes the whole exercise worthwhile.

Perhaps you could have a poll of the number of people who thought twice about drinking and driving because of this county-wide campaign - 32,000 people checked equates to a hell of a commitment from an under-staffed and under-resourced department of the police service.

Remember, there are an awful lot of travelling criminals, tax dodgers, insurance avoiders in this world and some just may have got their come-uppance, or, better still, did not come to Lancashire because of the risk of detection.

John Blunt should try holding someone's dead baby and then tell me that the exercise was a waste of police man hours.

Our Chief Constable is doing a great job and I know what she is up against.

DAVID S BERRY, (address supplied)

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