If those words from Wodonga Highway Patrol Sergeant Cameron Roberts don’t make you stop and think for a second, I don’t know what will.

Through awareness and increased testing, authorities have made great headway over the past three decades at reducing the number of fatalities from drink driving.

Before 1987, there was regularly more than 100 people killed on our roads each year as a result of drink-driving.

These days, the number is in the 20s or 30s annually.

That’s good progress but, of course, the only acceptable number is zero.

Just as that’s the case with drink-driving, it is with drug-driving and it’s welcome news for Border motorists that police will conduct hundreds more drug tests in the North East this financial year.

Officers in the Wodonga, Wangaratta and Cobram regions have received a “significant” increase to the availability of roadside testing kits. 

Sergeant Roberts said the area had one of the highest strike rates for drug drivers in Victoria with about one in three drivers tested returning positive results.

That doesn’t mean every third driver in our region is on drugs, it simply means the police are getting better at catching them.

“I think the harder we try, the more we get,” Sergeant Roberts says.

“Having an increase is certainly going to allow us to conduct more tests.”

In turn, that will mean more drug-drivers are off our roads, keeping you and your family safer.

Now that’s good news for everyone.

I hope you have a terrific Sunday.

Cheers, Xavier.