Summer 2008

You said - we did

In our Summer 2007 edition of Talkback we asked you your views on seat belt wearing across the Borough.

You said: more education and enforcement is needed to increase seat belt wearing in Calderdale.
We did.... draw up an action plan to develop educational resources; rolled out the ‘Seat Belt On’ project.

In Primary Schools we are using the ‘Smart and Not So’ assembly to engage pupils in car safety and giving very specific advice to parents about appropriate child seats through an age-specific comic book. 8000 pupils will have been trained by the end of Feb 2008. In Senior schools / colleges they told us they wanted to be shown why they should wear seat belts. So, with help from our partner services, we have developed a DVD depicting a fatal crash scene with interviews with all the emergency services explaining why seat belts are very important in preventing death and injury. 17000 booklets are being produced to complement the DVD.

The worst offenders for flouting seat belt laws are those ‘Driving for Work’. We are hoping to develop a booklet aimed at employers and employees, as those who drive for work have a high risk of death or serious injury – about 30% of those killed or seriously injured on the roads are working at the time.

We are also planning to work with new parents to ensure the correct advice is given at the start of a child’s ‘journey’ through life , as well as working with the Licensing section to persuade all Taxis to display seat belt wearing notices in their vehicles (this is currently not a compulsory safety feature).

We have erected 120 roadside ‘Seat Belt On’ posters, reminding drivers to buckle up. This provides direct advice in a place where drivers will see the message.

For those who have chosen to ignore the advice we have been able to target enforcement towards those groups especially in those areas that evaluation tells us seat belt rates are low. Over 800 tickets have already been issued and an added benefit has been that many drivers stopped have also been caught and convicted for using mobile phones, driving without a licence, tax and insurance. This has resulted in many vehicles being confiscated.

The ‘Seat Belt On’ project is not just protecting car occupants but also making the roads in Calderdale even safer for everyone.

Early indications also suggest that we may be reducing the numbers of car occupant deaths and injuries through the initiative – this statistic however needs more time to be monitored before accurate comparisons can be drawn.

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