As of 12am Friday, August 3rd, drivers in Ireland will face a further seven new penalty points, bringing to 48 the overall number of offences drivers can be penalised for.
Following a successful month of campaigning, the focus this time is on seatbelts, in particular focusing on persons under the age of 17 and babies placed in car seats. The aim is to penalise drivers and more specifically parents who ignore the advice of using a seatbelt, including those who put babies in the front seat of the car in a rear-facing baby-seat. A baby's neck can be snapped if the air-bag is deployed in a crash, so it's no wonder the government is clamping on this offence.
RSA recently found that of 5,000 child car seats that they analysed, 3/4 of them were either the wrong size for the child, not suitable for the model of car or just wrongly installed - shocking statistics!
We blogged about this before in fact, and the shocking outcomes of not securing the child seat correctly. From this weekend however, these drivers will be punished for not having a child secured in a seat suitable for them.
Truck and bus drivers are also on the receiving end of the new points, they had been excluded until now pending the roll-out of mandatory installation of seatbelts in these vehicles, but now looks like they need to be more compliant as well.
Be extra careful ahead of the coming bank holiday weekend if you're out and about. Have everyone secure and safe in the car, front and back, regardless of their age.
