Catherine Cole, Bahar ic-Caghaq
Children unbuckled and unsafe in cars
Isn't the time well overdue for the law to be enforced without exception with regard to the strapping-in of children in the rear seats of vehicles? Every day I see cars with mummy and daddy safely sitting within the confines of their seatbelts and the children all over the place in the back seat! And this is becoming more and more frequent now that the schools are on holiday. Even worse is a child sitting on the lap of an adult in the front seat - again, adult securely belted, child a prospective projectile.
I would like to think that the driving is so good that the prospect of an accident is minimal (an excuse frequently used for not belting in children) but if you lived just off the Coast Road as I do, you would see how badly adults can drive with their unbelted "precious" cargoes on board.
I have often felt like stopping and ask them how much they love the child in the back of the car - but fear I would get abuse instead of their feeling guilty! I did do this once, sometime ago, and the mother said: "I do belt him in, but he keeps undoing it".
Honestly, it seems like the parent and child have reversed roles - ridiculous! I am sure that if the parent got a ticket or two, the child would soon stop undoing the belt. And how parents can happily hand over the safety of their child/children in term- time to vans without the precaution of seatbelts has always astounded me. Another debate, of course.
Wardens need to do their jobs or are they concerned at the excuses/abuse they might get? I know badly parked cars can be a hazard and tickets, on the right occasions, are a necessary evil, but too much emphasis is being put on this and none on the protection of your innocent children.
Yes, "innocent" is the right word because they are too young to know the dangers - they rely on the adults who presume to love them to protect them.
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Phil Pryce
Jul 4th 2009, 15:00
Catherine, I have written on this subject several times and noone takes any notice. When parents have to pick their child's teeth out of the dashboard or worse, then they might take notice. As for the wardens, it is far easier and more profitable to pick on illegal parkers, and they do it when the car owner is not there, saving any confrontation. Sooner or later, some stupid parent is going to see their child fly past their head and go through the windscreen, which will almost certainly cause the child's death. They seem to think that at Malta's driving speeds, nothing like that could happen. But two cars travelling at 30 mph, which is quite slow, having a head-on collision and you have a 60 mph impact, so the child actually hits the windscreen at 60 mph. As with everything in Malta, we have to wait for this sadly inevitable death to occur before the powers that be wake up and do something.
B Crocker
Jul 4th 2009, 11:13
I AGREE but as Gift of Life would say protection in the womb at all costs but when outside who cares what happens to babies and children.