Obviously, child safety is paramount for all parents of small children and this has to include car safety. When a child reaches the age of three or four, they may be ready to graduate from car baby seat use, to a booster cushion. However, many parents are unaware that simply placing them in a seat belt is not enough. In order to ensure safety and avoid possible internal injury or even death, many experts agree that booster car seats may be necessary for children up to the age of nine! It really comes down to the size of the child so there are no hard and fast rules on age limits, some children may be ready for a booster seat or cushion by age 3 other would be at risk unless placed in a proper baby car seat before age 5!
It isn’t until people have children of their own that they realize how important car safety is for children. Baby car seats became a prime concern for new parents today but this has not always been the case, you do not have to go back many years to remember kids riding around in the front seats of cars in their parents laps! Most newbie parents today I’m sure, are looking for the best, safest car seat they can find.
Thankfully there are many kinds of infant car seats, so there really is no reason not to use one whenever carrying a child in a vehicle, even airport taxi services nowadays advertise MPV type vehicles with child car seats available. New laws which mean more children must use child car seats are now in force in the UK. Child seats or booster cushions are now compulsory for under-12s under 135cm (4ft 5in) tall. Drivers face fines from £30 on-the-spot or up to £500 in court if they do not ensure that the children they are carrying comply with the regulations. However some consumer groups are reporting that in the UK most parents are not ready for the new regulations, more education and training is definitely needed for parents to ensure they are not falling foul of local laws and also to ensure child safety.
When you have a new baby, it is extremely important to have the right baby car seat from day one. It also needs to be installed correctly in order to protect your baby in the event of an accident. Most maternity wards won’t discharge a mother and newborn baby until they see a suitable car seat fitted in the vehicle.
Other than nursery furniture ( cots etc), strollers,pushchairs and prams,car seats are probably new parents biggest concern.
You also want to look into the brand of seat you are buying when it comes to child car seat safety. Never buy a used seat, because you have no idea how it has been treated. A seat could have been in an accident, and its integrity has been compromised, and you cannot always tell simply by looking at the seat itself.
Traditionally the easiest kind of baby seat to use is the kind that has a base that gets buckled securely into the car, and the seat itself can be lifted off and carried around by the handle. The safest car seat systems available today are called ISOFIX, ISOFIX stands for “International Standards Organisation FIX”. It is a new standard for installing child seats into cars, which is being adopted by vehicle manufacturers and is intended to make fitting child seats quick and simple. Most new or nearly new vehicles will have isofix mountings, child seat manufacturers build ISOFIX fitting points on their child seats. This will enable ISOFIX child seats to be simply plugged into the ISOFIX points in the car. This eliminates the problem of incorrectly installing car seats using the seatbelts, many parents get confused with these fixings.
For more info on baby car seats and how to fit them correctly please see the department of transport guide on car child restraints
