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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

Was I unreasonable to let my mum drive 3 year old 1/2 a mile with no car seat?

189 replies

BurningBuntingFlipFlop · 31/08/2010 13:45

I'm not very well atm and this morning I was altogether rubbish so my mum offered to drop my ds of at nursery as she practically passes our hous on the way to work. She was running a bit late so I just ran out with ds and put him in the front with a seatbelt on. She drove the half a mile around the corner and as she stopped a random father at the nursery started having a massive go at her in front of ds, saying she was endangering his life etc. My mum was mortified, she called ne when she got to work and was nearly in tears.

So was i bu? It's not against the law btw, I checked.

OP posts:
loonyrationalist · 01/09/2010 17:11

Tokyo & Avril - just wanted to say you are doing a sterling job on trying to explain rational risk taking :)

sorrento56 · 01/09/2010 17:14
Hmm
loonyrationalist · 01/09/2010 17:15

Sorrento - I hope that is a million appropriately restrained miles. ;)

I disagree I think Tokyonambu's translation expressed your statement perfectly

sorrento56 · 01/09/2010 17:16

Disagree all you like, it isn't expressing my statement at all.

gobsmackedetal · 01/09/2010 17:16

sorrento, you missed my point entirely. I was saying that as parents we take calculated risks and we should under no circumstances feel entitled to yelling at each other because we feel different about what risks to take.

I put my children on an airplane 6 to 8 times a year and I'd be fuming if anyone had the nerve to say (no to mention yell) that I'm not looking after them and don't keep them safe

gobsmackedetal · 01/09/2010 17:22

I imagine myself at the airport, showin our passports. The airline guy would take a look and go spastic: 'weren't you here last month? What on earth are you thinking about putting these poor children at such risk? That's it, I'm calling the SS and let them know just how much travelling you impose on them"

Tangle · 01/09/2010 17:22

tokyonambu:
"I would never allow my children to ride in a car without a car seat."

Translation: I would never expose my child to an avoidable one in more than a million chance of death.

I presume you would never take your children on a plane under any circumstances?

---------

I'm not sure that's a fair comparison, though. Why does the fact that someone is prepared to take one risk (taking a flight) mean they shouldn't mitigate against another risk (not using a car seat)?
(I'm reserving judgment on whether using car seats actually improves outcomes until I've managed to read the book for myself Wink)

Comparing risks without also comparing benefits and consequences is meaningless. The benefits of a flight are likely to be great whilst the benefits of not fitting an available car seat are saving a few minutes of time - so why take that particular risk?

I'd be interested to know not how the CPS and police would react to the circumstance that BBFF and her mother wound up in but how they would react if there had been a serious accident.

gobsmackedetal · 01/09/2010 17:23

Hahaha
Forgive me, it's almost 10pm here, had too much booze and everything seems funny :-)

gobsmackedetal · 01/09/2010 17:24

BTW, I still wouldn't ride without a carseat, but def wouldn't yell at another parent for doing so.

OP, please give this c**k a piece of your mind and come back to tell

loonyrationalist · 01/09/2010 17:28

Sorrento - I am trying to gently say that your conception of risk seems faulty.

You seem to be implying that a 3 year old travelling with a seatbelt (but no car seat) is a comparable risk to say running across a main road without looking.

It isn't; the risk is a million to one. Whereas the risk of running across a busy road without looking is probably closer to 100 to 1

paisleyleaf · 01/09/2010 18:06

Language gobsmacked! Angry

tokyonambu · 01/09/2010 19:16

"I'm not sure that's a fair comparison, though. Why does the fact that someone is prepared to take one risk (taking a flight) mean they shouldn't mitigate against another risk (not using a car seat)? "

Even if you take the most absurd claims of the astounding benefits of child seats for children over three, the difference between "belted" and "belted into a booster seat" is a fraction of one in a million. The numbers are incredibly difficult to shape, but the risk of an unrestrained child dying during one journey is probably around one in a million, a restrained child one in two million and a restrained and car-seated child is between one in two million and perhaps one in two and a half million (but probably about one in two million). So the extra risk exposure of not using a child seat is between zero and one in five million.

Air travel has a rough lumped risk of one in a million journeys.

So if you believe that it's unacceptable to "risk" the massively less than one in a million additional risk of not using a booster seat (an additional risk which there is strong evidence to suggest is zero), how can plane travel be justified? Or being carried up stairs, come to that?

littleshinyone · 01/09/2010 19:21

I have assessed children in A&E who have been involved in collisions when not appropriately restrained, ranging from no injuie to major ones and I personally would feel unsettled by this situation as a result.

While OPs actions may have been within the letter of the law, I'm not sure that she would have been happy with her actions if someone had been driving badly and shunted her mums car, requiring DS to be seen by a doctor 'just in case'. It definitely raises eyebrows in A&E.

I'm guessing that the OP will give her mum a booster seat incase this happens again- and actually that maybe other MNers will too, so this thread will have benefited lots of kids.

I've been really interested by the research that's been posted here, thanks everyone!

AvrilHeytch · 01/09/2010 19:39

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn

StealthPolarBear · 01/09/2010 20:20

tokyo, while I agree about the assessment of risk, sorrento is talking about risk vs the actual effort needed to negate that risk. So the risk of travelling by plane has to be borne as there isn't usually a practical alternative. The risk of a car journey can easily be reduced if there is an option to strap in a car seat.

tokyonambu · 01/09/2010 21:38

" The risk of a car journey can easily be reduced if there is an option to strap in a car seat."

If that makes you feel better, fine. As I've repeatedly pointed out, there is considerable evidence that car seats are no safer than adult belts, and even the most favourable evidence suggests only about 20% benefit. Car travel is already very safe. That parents are worrying, to the point of shouting at other parents, about the reduction of already tiny risk by an (at best) tiny amount, shows that they have considerable amounts of time on their hands, or a completely misguided attitude to risk.

StealthPolarBear · 01/09/2010 21:41

completely agree with that :) Just saying that 20% benefit on a tiny risk may be extremely small, but if the only cost to you to reap that saving is strapping in a car seat then no big deal. If it was going to be an argument not to use a car, or to only drive outside of rush hour than that would be a stupid compromise to make.

cumfy · 01/09/2010 23:09

tokyonambu, have you considered an acturial career ? Wink

gobsmackedetal · 02/09/2010 06:08

"shows that they have considerable amounts of time on their hands, or a completely misguided attitude to risk"

...or a completely misguided attitude to parenting... or co-existin with other people Wink

usernamechanged345 · 02/09/2010 13:05

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Mingg · 02/09/2010 13:22

Agree with that interpretation mrspickels, there was no unexpected necessity.

tokyonambu · 02/09/2010 13:26

Mrs Pickles, what the police say and do is not a statement of the law: that's what the courts are for. The police may believe they are the arbiters, but they are not. I don't have my Freedom of Information hat on today, but were I in the mood, I'd be tempted to ask my local police force, which is a large one, just how many fixed penalty tickets have been issued in respect of children who are restrained, but not in a child seat. Because I'd place reasonable amounts of money (or at least, a round of house white) on the answer being "zero".

Certainly, when I used FoI to get a breakdown of fixed-penalty ticket enforcement (ie, of the tickets issued, what proportion are actually paid: this in the context of the effectiveness of ANPR cameras), there was no mention of this offence, so at most it's in the tiny "miscellaneous offences" category.

AvrilHeytch · 02/09/2010 13:32

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn

tokyonambu · 02/09/2010 13:41

"Having a 3 year old restrained by an adult safety belt seems to be as much of a faux pas as wearing knickers on your head."

Or cycling with knickers on your head, rather than a useless piece of expanded polystyrene...

Rosa · 02/09/2010 13:51

We had to take a taxi on a 20 mile trip to the airport it was an emergency as our planned driver was taken to hopsital. DD (4) sat in an adult seat with adult seat belt. DD2 (22m) sat in the incorperated seat which had an adult belt over it. It was a Black Cab and there was nothing else I could do ........
Certain situations mean certain measures.