New South Wales is spending $ 208 million in the coming decade fitting seat belts in school buses. Eventually, this will extend to the sixty thousand country school children who travel fifty million kilometres a year to and from school - often on roads with speed limits above eighty kilometres per hour.
It is amazing that it has taken this long, considering that the state is quite ruthless in imposing draconian fines and cancelling licenses for car drivers and passengers caught failing to buckle up.
At least this is moving in the right direction, but inconsistencies remain. Seat belt installation will not extend to buses that are used on normal passenger services as well as performing some school transport functions. It will only apply to buses that are exclusively used for school transport.
The other grey area concerns the practice of children remaining standing on school buses. In the past, we crammed kids in like sardines, often two to a seat and the balance strap hanging for the entire journey - and quite often this was on highways with a speed limit of a hundred k's per hour
The bus safety committee is adament that all students should have the protection of a safety belt, and that standing in school buses be completely banned at bus speeds of eighty kilometres per hour - or above.
It seems that Treasury can not find the money to implement the full recommendation and accident figures are keeping the lid on parent pressure to bring this to fruition. School buses have a marvellous safety record, with only three fatalities in the past decade.
Now this issue will face a new challenge. Today's students are a rebellious lot. Putting safety belts in buses is only one half of the job. The other half is insisting that students comply - and buckle up for every journey !
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