“He absolutely loves his big boy car seat!”

[Noti23]

...combined with picture showing a cute, smiley, barely of sitting age baby, in a toddler seat. ABUI to HATE seeing this all the time? A car seat is not a developmental milestone or achievement, safety should be priority. It makes me so sad that so many people seem to do this.

The latest Instagram post features a 6 month old baby sitting in his new “big boy” forward facing car seat.

You can get the Joie tilt for about £60, that's cheaper than the majority of forward facing car seats. To be honest if you are looking at a forward facing seat for around that price or less, it's probably of extremely poor quality and I would not recommend you use it.

But -

Whatever seat you use, use it as safely as you can. Read the instructions, install it correctly. A cheap car seat is better than no car seat at all. An improperly fitted car seat is better than no seat at all. A rear facing one is better than a forward facing one and this is particularly important before 15 months (why the legislation has changed) but a forward facing seat, properly used and of a good standard, for an older child will afford excellent protection in a crash. A rear facing one is significantly better, but it doesn't help to shame people.

A six month old should not be forward facing, and the only reason they legally can is because the weight classes were drawn up in the 80s, when using any car seat at all was fairly unusual. The newer 15 month rule will eventually cover all seats, but doesn't yet because policy makers are not interested in making life hard for parents but for making car travel safer for children.

I would expect to see the age for rear facing minimum increase in the future, and I'm glad that many parents are now aware of the risks of forward facing under a year. Personally my goal is 3, but I would consider FF from about 18m if other factors made it the more practical choice.

I do think RF is more accessible than most people realise though and I'd love to correct some myths! Tiny cars generally not a problem. Rear facing toddler seats take up less space depth wise than infant carriers, and people fit these in fine. They are also designed with better leg room, so children aren't folded up like concertinas! Although actually many of them find that position quite comfortable.

@ChewChewIsMySpiritAnimal how do?

Both are dangerous and should not be used with young babies

I would actually say you can compare it to cot bumpers - the vast, vast majority of babies sleeping with cot bumpers, and children in forward facing car seats will be fine. In fact the cot bumper might even protect them from a broken limb from catching it in the cot bars, or in times where safety regulations were less stringent, from slipping their body between wide bars and becoming entrapped and suffocating.

Not quite the same of course, because the FF car seat particularly for a child over 1-2y does have a good protective effect, not just from minor injuries but from crash forces in general. It will certainly prevent them from being thrown about the car which would almost certainly cause severe injury or death. But for a small number of children who are involved in a crash with the forces happening just right, the fact they were in that seat will cause them injuries, potentially life-changing or fatal injuries, that would not have occurred had they been rear facing. (Just like a tiny but significant minority of babies will be involved in fatal accidents with cot bumpers.) The chances are higher the younger they are. And that is a reason to stick to rear facing for as long as you can, whether that means absolutely maxing out the baby seat before you move to FF, or buying a toddler seat which can rear face up to 13kg (usually longer than the baby seat due to height) or 18kg (cheaper than the 13kg RF / 18kg FF seats these days) and turning them when they become uncomfortable, complain, get car sick, become too tall to fit comfortably behind the front seat etc, or whether it means buying a seat which can rear face as long as possible (25kg, currently) - to me I'm pleased if anybody does any of these things, and I don't understand some RF advocates who seem to have the opinion that there is ONLY one right choice which is to RF for as long as possible regardless of any other factors which might come into the decision.

And to the person who said driving less doesn't lessen the chance of an accident - it absolutely does! Not on a single journey of course, but over the course of an average year or month or thereabouts, yes, they have a lower chance of being involved in a car accident than somebody who drives more frequently. And may choose to judge the risk accordingly. I think that's fair.

@ChewChewIsMySpiritAnimal and as I was saying @PippaPegg said that they wouldn't be sold if not dangerous. And they are...

Ah yes, but this is a bit of a false economy Monkey, because you can buy the booster part of those seats for about £30, yet the 123 seats generally cost over £100. So if it's purely about cost, a Joie Tilt for £60 and then 2-3 years later, a high backed booster seat for £30 is a no brainer. And what people don't necessarily realise because the marketing focuses on "You'll never have to buy another seat!" is that 123 seats, even from decent manufacturers, tend to get absolutely dire safety results because what you want out of a Group 1 seat, which is fixed into the car and holds the child using a harness (stability, sturdiness) is absolutely not what you want from a Group 2/3, where the adult seatbelt routes around the child and holds both at once (lightness, flexibility) and hence trying to put both things into one seat means you compromise on one or both of those factors and therefore safety.

The only 123 seats which perform decently in independent testing are £250+ - not an economically friendly option (though a good price for ~10+ years of use, I suppose!) and they tend to need isofix and top tether, so they are really strapped down into the car and so don't need the lightness and flexibility parts. But somebody on a tight budget is less likely to have a very modern car and therefore may not be able to use a seat like these.

You are right.

(But on a different thread, about breastfeeding, lots of people are saying that it's wrong to tell other parents what to do and that parents should be able to judge for themselves what's the best option for their child.)

My baby is 7mo and it would seem crazy to put her in a FF seat so early.
Having said that, I moved my son to a FF seat around 2yo as he preferred it and is heavy and tall for his age. My friend commented on this as she's a paediatric A&E consultant and told me about the various injuries she's seen in children using inappropriately FF or badly fitted car seats, and the next day my son was RF again, and still is at nearly 4yo.

Winds me up. Same with people sitting tiny babies up in strollers, bottle propping and thinking it’s brilliant to give inappropriate food to their three month old because he is “hungry”

Tbh although I believe rf is best until 4 years old, I don’t judge people who ff their children over 12 months as I do understand why extended rf can be unaffordable.
We borrowed the money for our rf seat but we could have just about afforded the Joie tilt if we saved for a few months, so I can completely understand why people do it. Nevertheless, there is no excuse for ff a 6 month old as it is against the law- there should be policies in place to prevent it! Some people know they’re breaking the law but ignore it anyway and some just don’t know. I’ve seen an ‘Instagram family’ (Saccone Joly or something) who are millionaires, put their 2 year old in a ff high back booster with no harness- they have defended it, claiming it is their preference or something. I only noticed because of that Stacey Dooley doing a documentary on them and seeing it in the background.

I’m basically a young
(22), fairly broke mum with a small car (3 door Peugeot 207) so I get it. Nonetheless, why boast about a “big boy” seat when forward facing has nothing to do with how big or clever the baby is, it’s about neck muscles and bone strength, etc.

The price of car seats is just one of the many factors people should consider when choosing to not use contraception, no one can act shocked at the cost of them. No one should be pretending they didn’t know puffy winter coats under kid seatbelts can kill their child, it’s 2020, there’s no excuse for acting like a simpleton. People who are still choosing to produce humans in this day and age can’t pretend they don’t know the bare minimum to not kill their kid, ffs.

@Electrical

There are plenty of unplanned pregnancies out there... Or multiples.... Or changes in circumstances.
It's not entirely fair to say that cost should be factored into every baby being born.

Some people use contraceptive and it fails.

Unexpected babies aren't always due to unprotected sex.