[Article] Seatbelt Sheriffs to drive home safety laws

Victor

http://home.eircom.net/content/unison/national/4208270?view=Eircomnet

Seatbelt Sheriffs to drive home safety laws
From:The Irish Independent
Wednesday, 13th October, 2004

THE pester power of children is being put to good use in a new campaign to increase seatbelt wearing.

The 'Seatbelt Sheriff' campaign, devised by the National Safety Council (NSC) in conjunction with Renault, will see thousands of school children between the ages of six and eight sworn into office and pledge always to wear their seatbelt and to make sure everyone else in the car does the same.

Speaking at the launch in Dublin's Shelbourne Hotel yesterday, chairman of the NSC Eddie Shaw said despite improvements in recent years, Ireland still has a poor record when it comes to buckling up. Less than half of all adults and children wear seatbelts."The statistics are awesome - between 1998 and 2002 about 2,500 children travelling in cars were killed or seriously injured on our roads."

Research by the National Roads Authority found that only 68pc of primary school children wear front seatbelts, dropping to just 48pc in the rear.

Among secondary school children, 62pc buckle up in the front seat but only 44pc in the back.

Bill Cullen, chairman of Renault Ireland which is funding the distribution of 250,000 'Seatbelt Sheriff' packs to primary schools around the country, said: "We also have to look at the problem of the parent doing the school-run in the morning with four or five kids in the back and not enough seatbelts to go round."

Breda Heffernan

sliabh

I am always surprised at the low stats for seatbelt wearing. Regularly if I am on foot waiting at lights (or more usually for a gap in the traffic as there is no pedestrian crossing) I amuse myself by looking at car drivers. I see how many cars go by with only the driver in them, how many people are on their phones and I look at things like driver seat belt use.

And I'd have to say, in Dublin at least, seat belts are worn by 80-90% of people. I doubt the rest of the country is much worse so where is this poor "less than half" figure coming from?

leeroybrown

I'm presuming that they picked the shock figure by generalising the rear seat numbers to all cases.

I'm a little surprised the front seat figures are that low. The majority of people I know will use a seat belt by choice but won't force a passanger to use one. I can think of a few idiots who won't use one because they're being forced but it's their blunt force trauma in an accident, not mine.

What does annoy me is the number of kids you see jumping around un-restrained in the back of the car. Ironically, their parents probably shake their heads in disgust when they see others allowing their kids to stick their head out the guillotine (sorry, sunroof).

MrPudding

I’m afraid I am a bit of a seatbelt Nazi. I won’t move unless everyone is belted up. This comes from driving in the UK where the driver will get fined if any passengers aren’t belted up. Is there not something similar here?

On the subject of parent that let their kids jump around the car unrestrained. I think their kids should be taken into care. They are obviously not capable of looking after them and are consistently putting them in a life threatening situation . Parents have had children taken away for less.

MrP

BrianD

The simple way to increase seatbelt usage is that the passenger gets points for each unrestrained passenger.

leeroybrown

MrPudding wrote:

I’m afraid I am a bit of a seatbelt Nazi. I won’t move unless everyone is belted up. This comes from driving in the UK where the driver will get fined if any passengers aren’t belted up. Is there not something similar here?

I think (open to correction on this one) the current situation is that if you have non-belted passangers in your car you as the driver get the penalty points and they pay the €60 fine (unless they are under 17 in which case the fine is payable by the driver).

Personally speaking on the odd occasion I drive a car these days I always get people to belt up. Very few people have any issue with being told to belt up in someone elses car.

Alun

leeroybrown wrote:

Personally speaking on the odd occasion I drive a car these days I always get people to belt up. Very few people have any issue with being told to belt up in someone elses car.

I think the issue here should not be that you want to avoid getting points and/or a fine for letting people in the back seats not wear their seatbelts, but that you don't want two 80+kg lumps careering forward and hitting you in the back of the head at 30mph or more in the case of an accident.

I once had someone refuse to put his belt on in the back of my car, so I just refused to drive off until he either belted up, or got out and walked. In the end he belted up reluctantly, and he's never asked for a lift again

Pataman

If you as the driver have any adult passengers in the car that are not wearing seatbelts, they get fined. If you have under 17's in the car without seatbelts you get 2 penalty points for the whole offence, not 2 points per child.