Ronan Keating calls for stronger penalties for fatal road offences in Ireland

Ronan Keating spoke out about the harrowing loss of his brother

The singer's brother was tragically killed in a road traffic accident in July 2023.

Ronan's brother Ciaran died after Dean Harte veered onto the wrong side of the N5 and collided with Keating's car.

Keating and his wife Annmarie were travelling to their son's soccer match at the time of the fatal accident.

Annmarie suffered life-changing injuries in the accident and could not attend her husband's funeral because of the injuries she sustained.

Dean Harte was given a 17-month suspended sentence after he pleaded guilty to careless driving causing death. The sentence was suspended for two years.

Harte was also banned from driving for two years.

Speaking about the menial sentence, Ronan Keating said something needs to change in Ireland.

He told RTÉ's Drivetime: "As a family, we don’t want to send some 22-year-old kid to jail. We don’t want to see some kid go to jail whose life is going to be thrown away. That’s not what we’re looking for.

“But what we’re looking for is to make sure somebody else doesn’t die because of careless driving. That some other family’s life is not going to be ripped apart.”

“We’ve looked at other cases, other families and what they’ve gone through – some more recent than ours. It’s continuing to happen. Something needs to change,” Keating added.

“We’re just another family that have been scarred by this broken system."

Keating vowed, "We won't let this lie."