TOUGH new drink-driving laws are being demanded in an effort to cut serious accidents on Lancashire's roads.

Force bosses are backing the Association of Chief Police Officers' call to reduce the legal limit from 80mg to 50mg of alcohol in 100ml of blood.

The decision, ratified at a meeting of the association's policy body, will increase pressure for action from the Government.

A spokesman for Lancashire police said: "Anything which will make Lancashire's roads safer is to be welcomed.

"The force has been active in numerous drink-drive campaigns and these have consistently revealed a hard core of motorists who flout the law, endangering the lives of themselves and others."

Lancashire police's crackdown on drink drivers included 19.520 breath tests on the county's roads during 1995/96, more than doubling the number in the previous 12 months.

The spokesman added: "We would definitely back any future moves to make the county's roads safer."

The British Medical Association, backed by the Parliamentary Advisory Council for Transport Safety and the pressure Group Alcohol Concern, called for a 50mg limit earlier this year. A BMA report noted that a similar reduction in Australia, combined with random breath-testing, dramatically reduced drink-driving.

Automobile Association spokeswoman Rebecca Rees said it backed the ACPO move, but warned that it was not the total solution.

She said: "We still believe there's a hard-core of hardened drink-drivers, people who totally ignore the limit, who are the main offenders and those are the people the police need to target."

The proposed limit would allow most people to drink no more than a pint of beer and could mean problems for people driving the morning after a night of drinking.

A reduced limit would bring Britain into line with Europe's strictest anti-drink-driving countries.

A Department of Transport spokesman said: "We keep these things constantly under review, but we have no plans to change the law at the moment."

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