Child car seat safety checks for Slough
Slough Borough Council’s trading standards team and Berkshire Fire and Rescue will be holding free child car seat checks at Asda, Telford Drive, on 7th and 8th August.
The check forms part of the council’s cleaner, safer, greener campaign to ensure that people using Slough borough’s roads do so as safely as possible.
The teams will be in the car park from 10.30am to 12.30pm and 14.30pm to 16.30pm to make sure that child seats are fixed to cars properly and safely.
When the same checks were made in March this year, out of the 64 car seats checked, only 30 passed. Most of the faults were due to loosely fitted seats, seats not fitting the car properly, and incorrect seat belt routing, all of which can be easily amended.
One of the more shocking finds was buckle crunch, where any part of the plastic from the surround of the seat can rest on the car’s seatbelt clip.
This is dangerous because the pressure exerted will pop or crack the buckle on impact. In a crash at 30mph a child’s body is thrown forward at six times its normal weight, making the child weigh the same as a baby elephant.
There are around a quarter of a million road accidents a year in which someone is injured and around 3,500 people die, including about 30 children aged between zero and 11.
Every year 450 children are seriously injured.
Emma Richards, technical enforcement officer for Slough Borough Council, said: “These free checks are extremely important and I cannot stress enough that every parent who has a child seat should come along and have it looked at.
“Many seats are fitted wrongly and this can cause serious injury to a child if their car is involved in an accident.
“We all want the best for our children and just because you may have paid a lot of money for a seat thinking it would be better quality, the fitting is just as important.”
Commissioner for public protection, Councillor John Edwards said: “It is very important that parents take this opportunity to have their child seats checked over.
“The checks are free to all and could save many lives. Ensuring that a child’s seat is fitted correctly will improve the safety of our children on the borough’s roads, as well as deliver peace of mind to parents.”
Slough Borough Council