Suspected drink-drivers will be spared the walk of shame to the booze bus after a failed roadside breath test thanks to a new device.

The Bay of Plenty will be one of the first regions to have new Draeger 7510 breathalysers.

Evidential roadside breath tests could be carried out in the next couple of weeks.

Police say the new breath-testing devices will cut down on time spent ferrying suspects to and from police stations for evidential tests.

At the moment, a driver who blows over the limit at a checkpoint or a crash scene must walk to a nearby booze bus of be taken to the nearest police station to undergo another breath test on a machine.

The results are then provided to the courts.

With the introduction of the Draeger 7510, which is due to be rolled out in the middle of this month, evidential breath tests can be carried out on the roadside.

The first 200 devices will be distributed to police in the Bay of Plenty, Eastern, Central, Wellington and Southern districts.

Road policing assistant commissioner Dave Cliff says the new devices would make a significant difference for rural areas 'where still too many people are being killed on the weekend”.

Dave says: 'At the moment, particularly in those rural locations, some of our country cops can have to take people back for 50 or 60 kilometres before they can test someone evidentially back at a police station.

'So with the new devices it means they can test someone in the back of a car on the roadside immediately, which allows for a lot more streamlined processing.”