You’ve seen them, haven’t you?
Those cute photos on Facebook?
Your friends’ children after a fun day out …. in the car….. fast asleep….. exhausted. Bless those tired little limbs.
I’ve seen them and probably like everyone else thought the same, but then the panic sets in as I realise that the car seat ( if there is one) isn’t right for their precious little cargo.
So what would you do? Tell them via a quick humorous comment? then hope they ask what’s wrong with it? Should you direct message them? Risking the chance of being unfriended?
Would you ignore it? Surely this isn’t an option. What if something happens and their child gets seriously injured, or worse? Could I live with the thought that I should have said something? No. Could you?
Should the worse happen, could posting an image of an incorrectly restrained child on a social media website be used as evidence of their failure to conform with the law?
Or, could your friend actually say ” thanks, I didn’t realise! “
We make sure our children are protected and safe in so many ways; cyber bullying, stranger danger, immunisation etc. We keep them healthy with 5-a-day regime. We make them wear helmets on a bike, slap on sunscreen when it’s hot and wrap up warm when it’s cold. But when it comes to travel, we sometimes become a little blasé.
Well for what it’s worth – having worked with many police forces on seatbelt and car seat enforcement campaigns and having told thousands of parents that their child’s seat isn’t right for them, I can tell you 95% of them will say ” thanks, I’ve learnt something today”
Perhaps it’s easy for us to say – “But you’re the experts!” I hear you scream! If you don’t know that something’s not right and yet don’t know the answer, feel free to send them our way.
Yes, we do know our car seats, but sometimes that works against us with friends and family as we know they’re thinking “oh she’s on her high horse again.”
We know our stuff but we are also mums. Imagining our own children in that situation is enough to build up our passion for safety.
So how about looking out for each other, protecting our kids together and being able to look someone in the eye and hear them saying ” thanks you may have just saved my child’s life today”
Julie Dagnall
Director of Child Seat Safety Limited