A traffic offence is defined as an action against the traffic regulations. Traffic offences can be of different kinds (parking offences, speeding, driving under the influence of drugs, driving without a permit, hit-and-run offences, etc.). There are two types of traffic offences: contraventions and offences that are punished differently depending on their degree of seriousness.
In 2022, 30 million traffic offences will be recorded by the national police force (NP), the automated control system (AC) and the municipal police force (MP), more than in 2017 (+1.4%).
Offences (including municipal police)
876,439 offences (+22% on 2019, +47% on 2017) and 29.2 million fines (+18% on 2019, +0.5% on 2017). The fall in contraventions excluding dangerous parking since 2017 on the NP and AC side (20.2 million in 2022 compared with 20.9 million in 2017) is offset by the rise on the MP side (1.5 million in 2022 compared with 0.7 million in 2017).
56% were speeding tickets, i.e. 16.9 million offences, of which 240 were misdemeanours.
The remaining tickets are broken down as follows:
- 7.4 million offences concern dangerous parking, i.e. 24.8% of all offences.
- 2.1 million administrative offences, or 6.8% of all offences. Since 2018, some of the offences for not having insurance or not having a driving licence have been dealt with by means of fixed penalty fines (AFD): 127,397 AFD for not having insurance, out of 206,190 offences, and 24,858 AFD for not having a driving licence, out of 147,713 offences.
- 1.7 million non-delict offences against the rules of the road (including 528,213 uses of mobile phones, 58,095 wearing of earphones).
- 825,112 non-criminal offences against the rules of priority, including 355,253 "red light" offences detected by automated enforcement systems. 191,096 offences for failing to stop at a red light and 153,687 offences for failing to obey a stop sign.
- 342,342 non-criminal offences for lack of user equipment, including 176,325 for not wearing a seatbelt, 43,309 for not wearing a helmet and 71,077 for not wearing gloves on motorised two-wheelers.
- 180,759 offences concerning the condition of vehicles.
- 158,682 offences for drink-driving, of which 118,980 were offences (75%).
- Some offences are offences only. These include 189,397 hit-and-run offences after an accident (22% of offences), 117,351 drug-related offences (13% of offences), and 32,751 offences for refusing or obstructing a control (4% of offences).
Alcohol and drug testing
7.9 million alcohol tests were conducted in 2022, of which 3.4% were positive. 98% of these tests were preventive (initiated by law enforcement) or during violations, 3.2% were positive. 81 359 tests were conducted during personal injury accidents (including fatal ones), 9.6% of users tested had a blood alcohol level above the legal limit, a steady increase since 2016. 115,532 tests were carried out during material accidents. They are positive in 10% of cases.
630,957 drug tests were conducted in 2021, of which 17% were positive. 86% of these tests were preventive or during violations, 19% were positive. 46,660 tests were performed in injury crashes (including fatal crashes), 6.5% of tested drivers involved in injury crashes were positive for drugs.
7.9 million alcohol tests were conducted in 2022, of which 3.4% were positive. 98% of these tests were preventive (initiated by law enforcement) or during violations, 3.2% were positive. 81,359 tests were conducted during personal injury accidents (including fatal ones), 9.6% of users tested had a blood alcohol level above the legal limit. 11.4% of the 113,300 tests conducted on material accidents were positive.
764,331 drug tests were conducted in 2022, of which 15.6% were positive. 88% of these tests were preventive or during violations, 17% were positive. 51,781 tests were conducted in the event of injury accidents (including fatal accidents), 6.7% of which were positive.