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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To want to get out of the car and bang all the people who dont wear seat belts up against their window screen to show them what it would be like to crash ?

65 replies

gingeme · 08/05/2007 20:30

I went out with my dh today in our car and within 20 minutes I counted 23 people in various modes of transport without belts on. Especially those with kids in the car

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Original poster
gingeme · 08/05/2007 21:23

Ah right didnt know that. Good point.

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SparklyGothKat · 08/05/2007 21:24

I walked hom with dd1 and dd2 when they left SCBU, I remember the shock from the nurses who didn't know what to do, in the end they made sure they were wrapped up well and safe

Original poster
gingeme · 08/05/2007 21:26

That must have been one slow walk home Sparkly!

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Original poster
gingeme · 08/05/2007 21:27

How long has the sealt belt law been going? I remember good old Jimmy Saville saying Clunk Click every trip...

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luciemule · 08/05/2007 21:30

I know my parents used to put the huge pram top in the back seat with no seat belt around it and I was born in 1977 so it must have been after that. Then I remember, at about 3, being strapped in with an isofix type thing of the time with a harness style seat restraint.
The laws are crap though as it isn't releavant for taxes (although some do have them), buses or trains. I still haven't taken DCs on public transport as there are no belts that can be fitted with car seats. I guess the likelyhood of a bus/train crash is a huge amount less than a car crash though.

Original poster
gingeme · 08/05/2007 21:36

They should change the law especialy with twice as many cars on the road now. Not sure how they would do it. Like Luciemule said maybe they should bring it into the schools a bit more. I mean the Green Cross Code was drummed into us this should be too.

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Lilymaid · 08/05/2007 21:39

Rear seat belts became compulsory (to be fitted rather than used) from around the beginning of 1987, I know because I was in the rear seat of my FIL's car (a Maestro and without seatbelts) at the end of 1986 when it was involved in an accident. I ended up in hopital on skull traction & could have died. If I was a child I would have been thrown forwards and possibly injured the front seat passengers on my way towards the front window. When his car was replaced it had seat belts in the rear.
Front seat belts have been compulsory (first to have them fixed, later to have to wear them)from the 70s.

Original poster
gingeme · 08/05/2007 21:41

So why oh why are people still driving around not bloody wearing them?
So glad your ok Lilymaid.

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MrsWho · 08/05/2007 22:05

I can remember having a car seat in the early 80s.

My Dad recntly went o a trip with some friends and none of them were wearing seat belts and they got stopped and all got fined.
My Dad still has to be told to wear one though so its obviously not enough

MrsWeasley · 08/05/2007 22:12

I was speakless last week when a friend of my neighbours drove passed me in her convertible beetle (with the roof down) with her year 2 daughter (so aged 6 or 7) standing in the back with no belt on!

wassername · 08/05/2007 22:20

We were strapped in the car as kids and I have always been too scared (of an accident, not of the police)to allow my kids to travel without being in car seats. I think there is a cultural/generational thing here - my Italian parents in law have travelled in the back of the car with a grandchild on their lap , but then I think about how many times I've seen toddlers standing between their mum or dad's knees riding on a Vespa in Italy...bloody madness. I also see many more Asian families with children not strapped in - any Asian parents on MN this evening? Is there a similar attitude to my Italian in laws?

Original poster
gingeme · 08/05/2007 23:01

Paople dont realise theyre doing wrong till its too late. They love their kids and would do anything for them. So for goodness sake strap them in. Anyway ladies thankyou for your esponses. Im glad Im not theonly one to feel so strong about this. Im going to bed now. Will pop back at some point tommorrow.

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luciemule · 09/05/2007 09:19

Might email the DETR (or whatever it is) and ask them about advertising the car seat thing more. They were quite good in responding to my queries about public transport and seat belts.

Original poster
gingeme · 09/05/2007 09:42

Motning. Luciemule thats a goo idea. Is there anyone I could wright to? Maybe if a few of us had a go they might take some notice and get something done. Im not going anywhere in the car today. Good job realy I might bash someone!!

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luciemule · 09/05/2007 09:51

I just emailed before but it's the Dept of transport and the environment you would need to write to I think.

Original poster
gingeme · 09/05/2007 10:01

Right you are. Ill give it a try. Let me know if you get anyhwhere wont you?

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Kelly1978 · 09/05/2007 10:01

I thought of this thread today when I pulled out. I tend to pull out then put my belt on. A playdate last week was yelling at me to put my belt on I never ever go before the kdis are all strapped in though.

luciemule · 09/05/2007 10:25

There's no reason why your belt shouldn't be on before you set off is there? Not critisising but someone could hit you just a few metres from your house.

NineUnlikelyTales · 09/05/2007 10:31

When I was a passenger in a hire car abroad in a country where seat belts are not the norm, and the car wasn't fitted with them, we had a car crash at approx 20mph or less. I hit the windscreen and ended up with concussion and whiplash, and badly bruised shins where my legs bashed the footwell. If the car had been going any faster I would have gone through that windscreen and very likely died or been seriously injured. I would NEVER get in a car without seatbelts now, for any reason, and I always put it on before setting off. It can't do it's job if you aren't wearing it, even for a moment.

lyrabelacqua · 09/05/2007 11:29

Kelly, surely you're distracted from driving if you're fiddling with your belt at the same time. DP does this and it drives me mad.

Kelly1978 · 09/05/2007 12:34

I'm usually running late, and it is an automatic, so it's like like I have to faff around with gears and try to belt up. I know I should do it beforehand, it is a bad habit.

NineUnlikelyTales · 09/05/2007 13:00

Kelly please keep yourself safe too - your DC need you.

Original poster
gingeme · 09/05/2007 13:27

Belt first Kelly please? For me? The road round where we live is very busy so who knows what could happen just a few seconds from where we live. I always put my belt on as soon as I get in the car. I actualy didnt do it the other day,cant remeber why exactly, and I nearly cried when I realised. Next time you go out in your/dh's car have a look and see how many people you count not wearing a belt. Its shocking.

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Wallace · 09/05/2007 13:31

my dh doesn't wear a seat belt. He was in a car crash years ago - he wasn't wearing a seatbelt and was thrown from the car. He was told that if he had had a seatbelt on he would be dead.

Therefore man-logic means: seatbelt=dead

DontCallMeBaby · 09/05/2007 13:37

Oh Wallace, definitely at man-logic. I have the opposite story of talking to a policeman after I crashed my mum's car, who said 'I won't even ask you if you were wearing your seatbelt, you wouldn't be stood here talking to me if you weren't'. The windscreen was ten feet away from the car, I guess with the greater momentum of a human body I'd have been 20+ feet away.

DD's nursery had a road safety person in last week, telling them all how they mustn't cross roads on their own, and they must always be strapped in in a car ... I think she already had the message though, she got quite upset about sitting on my lap whilst crawling round a safari park at 2mph and demanded to go back in her seat.