JOHN BISSET/STUFF Jan Hide at the Timaru Courthouse in January, when she called for roadside drug-testing to be brought in urgently. Her father, William Gordon Howey, 93, died in 2018, nine days after Jayden Duffell, 23, who had tetrahydrocannabinol, the active ingredient in cannabis, in his blood, drove into the path of his car. OPINION: As the nation heads to the bach, the bush and the beach, media attention understandably places a premium on the holiday road toll. In the closing days of 2020, the annual road toll is pleasingly headed for a four-year low, with 35 fewer road deaths than in 2019. The national lockdown and subsequent regional restrictions arguably played a big role, given the sustained reduction in road traffic during those elevated alert levels, although we’re still on track to clock up around 320 annual road fatalities.