A Survey of Operational Police Involved in the Delivery of Random Breath Testings (RBT) in Queensland, Australia

Abstract

Over the last two decades, there has been a major reduction in the involvement of alcohol in road crashes in Australia. The evidence suggests that a key factor in this reduction has been the introduction and ongoing operation of Random Breath Testing (RBT). This paper reports on the findings of a survey of operational police involved in the delivery of RBT. The primary aim was to identify those factors that acted as either facilitators or barriers to the effective delivery of RBT at an operational level. With the assistance of the Queensland Police Service (QPS), a questionnaire was distributed to a random sample of 950 operational police likely to be involved in the delivery of RBT, stratified by the QPS’s geographic regions. A total of 421 questionnaires were returned representing a 44% response rate. The survey results confirmed that there is strong support for RBT among operational police in Queensland. While the participants indicated that they were adequately trained and supported to perform the task, a number of potential areas for improvement were identified. Central among these is the need to develop more formal rewards for conducting RBT and to provide more information to operational police about the success of the program.