Car safety - What do you think ??

cynder

deemark wrote: »

Ok, so there is a slightly increased risk of ending up in water then. But, your chances of being involved in ANY collision are far greater than the chances of ending up in deep water, unable to release a child from a seat belt. It seems to me that you are justifying the non-wearing of a seat belt with an unlikely scenario.

I only said that's why i would not tie my fella in (meaning using something to prevent him from opening his seat belt).
would a more likely scenario be where the car bursts into flames (after an accident) child is secured in a seat belt and it the seat belt has an extra security attachment no one can open it child burns to death in the car, unless some passer by has scissors to cut seat belt. That's why i will not use an extra security feature.

did you not read the earlier post:

Its from a link moonbeam put up.

http://www.theaa.com/motoring_advice/child_safety/belts_buckles.html

Releasing Buckles
How to stop children undoing their seat belts

Most children will eventually find they can undo their seat belt. So why don't they make seat belts that can't be undone by a child? This is because it must be possible to release the belt in an emergency, quickly and easily.

At worst this might be with a car inverted in a ditch at night, with access at arm's length through a window, or by a person in shock, unfamiliar with such equipment.


Don't be tempted to make additional security attachments to the buckle. Anything like this will inevitably compromise safety and again tends to be only temporarily effective, presenting a new challenge rather than solving the problem.

January

Grindlewald, I think it's time to take Orions advice and stop posting on this thread. You're getting nowhere with your arguments.

Ayla

Grindlewad, I think the point everyone's making here is whether or not you define these parents as BAD, by putting the child's desire for fun (in the OP's case) over your sense of parental duty to ensure their safety to the best of your ability is just plain IRRESPONSIBLE and ILLEGAL.

Justify it all you want (and in your particular case maybe you have a stronger case than others) but the majority of parents who allow their kids to stand up through the sun roof in a moving car are just being irresponsible.

doubletrouble?

since coming over to the parenting forum i have to admit it's been quite a reading experience in most of the threads and a real eye opener. reading this thread it brought back memories of an incident going back many years of where i used to live as a kid. there were a couple of kids locked in a car while the mother/ parents went into a house. next thing the car went up in flames .cant remember if they died or were badly burnt. but as far as i can remember. the kids and found matches and played with them in the car.
but getting back the the thread in general. it's only now that i see things in the wider picture and up until coming here i'd see things and never really take any notice. one of the most common things i see is the to do with mothers especially. they pick up their kids at school ,some would be strapped in others wouldn't but the most appalling thing is they'd be having full blown conversations on their mobiles whilst driving. yesterday i saw some guy with a few kids in the back of his car. he cuts up some traffic and takes off and blatently goes through a red light a few hundred yards up. as i said up up until coming over here i wouldn't have taken much notice but now i take in everything around me. if i was alot closer i'd have got the guards.
why do people always put the innocent at risk?

The Big Red Button

grindelwald wrote: »

Yes it is law, but hundreds of thousands of people each day decide if they want to break the law, they pick n choose which law they are willing to break, be it speeding or talking on the phone, Im not advocating breaking the law, I have no criminal record, never been arrested and have no penalty points. I also think that a person who speeds/talks on the phone is just as irresponsible, i would not call them a bad parent, were not perfect and never will be

Well, I would call them a bad parent and an irresponsible driver. But this thread is not about speeding or talking on the phone?

grindelwald wrote: »

Cars seats a a great safety feature, if used and fitted correctly at the moment 3 of of 4 are not (rsa) are the parents as irresponsible or a bad parent? an ill fitting car seat is as bad as not being in one.

Surely it is 100% the parent's responsibility to ensure that the car seat is fitted correctly? Of course the parent is being irresponsible by not ensuring this!

grindelwald wrote: »

I believe that buses and taxis still dont have car seats in them and are not required to by law, would it be irresponsible to use a bus or taxi because of this or would you not see the danger and take the chance, leaving a under 3 year old unrestrained in the back seat? over 3 they have to use an adult seat belt, i also believe that classic cars that have no rear seat belts are also permitted to carry children over 3 in the back seat unrestrained.

Oh come on. I had to bring my little sister in a taxi a few times when she was a baby/toddler. I was in my late teens at the time, but of course I had enough cop on to ensure that I had her car seat with me and that she was fully secured before we went anywhere.

Are you seriously saying that you would knowingly allow your child to travel completely unsecured in a taxi or in a classic car, and that if they were killed, you would absolve yourself of all responsibility because it wasn't illegal?!

grindelwald wrote: »

would a more likely scenario be where the car bursts into flames (after an accident) child is secured in a seat belt and it the seat belt has an extra security attachment no one can open it child burns to death in the car, unless some passer by has scissors to cut seat belt. That's why i will not use an extra security feature.

OK you have been watching far too much TV. This is an incredibly unlikely scenario, for a car to spontaneously "burst into flames" after an accident - and if the accident was bad enough for this to happen, there'd be very little hope for anyone in the car anyways.

Also, because of the way seatbelts work, they very often get "locked" after a bad collision anyways, meaning that the only way they can be released after the accident is to cut them. Because of this, I always carry a scissors in the compartment beside the steering wheel, for use in the incredibly unlikely event that my car will end up underwater/on fire. In your own case, if you were to weigh up the odds of (A) your child being killed in a normal car accident because of being unsecured, or (B) your child being killed because you crashed so badly that the car goes on fire, and your child cannot be released from his childseat, I think you'd find scenario (A) is a hell of a lot more likely. It's impossible to prevent injuries and deaths from happening; but there's plenty you can do to minimise the probability of accidents happening, and to minimise the severity of them when they do. It's lazy parenting not to do this.


As for your arguments that you weren't properly strapped in and it never did you any harm. Come on, that's not even an argument. Sure when I was a kid, we used to travel everywhere with 8-9 in the car (a few of us in the boot, someone on mammys knee or on the floor in front of her, no one strapped in.) Did it ever do us any harm - no; but does that mean I'd ever chance it with my own kids whether it was legal or not - hell no!

You can take chances with your kids and get away with it 99 times. That doesn't make it OK if something goes wrong the 100th time. Of course you can't wrap them up in cotton wool, some risks are unavoidable. But in my opinion, ever letting a child travel unrestrained under any circumstances is pretty unforgivable. Travelling in a car is the most dangerous thing we do every day; accidents can and do happen all too often without warning. If your child is unrestrained at the time of an accident for whatever reason, it is your fault and your failing as a parent to protect your child, and I don't know how anyone could live with that if the worst happened.

Tabnabs

I saw a classic last night that I wanted to share. Sitting in a queue at the traffic light in an estate, car pulls up behind me with a man and a little girl in the back in a car seat. Two women are walking past the car and they all seem to know each other.

The guy turns around and unclips the little girl so she can stand up and talk to the women through a half opened window. The traffic lights go green, they all wave goodbye and off the man drives, the little girl (about 3) standing waving back to the women.

The car then turns onto the main road and off they go...

ash23

chatterpillar wrote: »

Oh come on. I had to bring my little sister in a taxi a few times when she was a baby/toddler. I was in my late teens at the time, but of course I had enough cop on to ensure that I had her car seat with me and that she was fully secured before we went anywhere.

Are you seriously saying that you would knowingly allow your child to travel completely unsecured in a taxi or in a classic car, and that if they were killed, you would absolve yourself of all responsibility because it wasn't illegal?!

Emmm, I don't see how it is practical to travel by taxi bringing a car seat. I used to have to get taxis when my daughter was a toddler as I didn't drive. I'd be going into town to do grocery shopping, bank etc (back in pre internet banking/shopping era) and there was no way I could lug around a massive car seat with me all day.
We used public transport a lot back then and for longer journeys on buses and trains you'd just have to rely on the safety belt. It's impractical to suggest someone travelling regularly by coach/taxi should also transport a car seat. It was fine when she was tiny and I had the seat that clipped into the buggy, but not once she out grew that. Even now I wouldn't bring her booster with me if I was getting the bus. What would I do with it for the day?

Morag

From a young age we told the kids the car won't work if the belts are not on.

silverharp

Sharrow wrote: »

From a young age we told the kids the car won't work if the belts are not on.

I wouldnt agree with that, Its better to tell kids how the world works, not create a fiction around certain things.

implausible

silverharp wrote: »

I wouldnt agree with that, Its better to tell kids how the world works, not create a fiction around certain things.

I'd rather keep them safe, thanks.

silverharp

deemark wrote: »

I'd rather keep them safe, thanks.

its hardly one or the other never had to do it in this house or threaten the kid that "the man" will come for them if they do x

implausible

If telling them that the car doesn't work makes them put on their seat belt, isn't it worth it? We tell our kids all sorts of lies to keep them from the fire, away from the road, to get their dodies off them, to get them to behave. The ultimate aim is to do something for their own good.

I hardly think that creating a fiction around certain things does them psychological damage. Most of us have survived through the horrors of Santa, the tooth fairy and I don't want to get into a debate on the existence of God.....

January

silverharp wrote: »

its hardly one or the other never had to do it in this house or threaten the kid that "the man" will come for them if they do x

While they're young I'll use it, it's not like 2 and a half year old will hate me forever for telling her a white lie, it's like telling them about the man in the red suit at this stage. Wouldn't use the "the man" one now...

lonestargirl

Just to illustrate how a simple accident can happen even at low speed someone over in the motors forum posted about a near miss they had yesterday.

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2056316156

He had to jam on the brakes, if his child had been on his lap where would he have ended up?

cynder

Saw a 7 year old boy on the bonnet of a car yesterday and the person behind the wheel was still driving (dont know if it was his dad but they did know eachother) Parked my car turned around and the person was then out of the car running after the 7 year old.