When it comes to school, you can never spend too much time studying.
Kids learn the more time they spend preparing for tests, the better off they’ll be.
But when it comes to school bus safety, we don’t need any more studying than what we’ve already had.
A committee of MPs has ruled against having seat belts on school buses, saying that additional study is needed.
Should we ever be surprised when a federal government committee says more study is needed?
But you have to wonder why they think this way. We know that seat belts make vehicles safer. We know that school buses don’t have seat belts.
So what exactly are they studying?
That’s not to say that this issue is finished, just that it’s likely going to take longer for it to be resolved.
The committee’s final report includes a number of recommendations to beef up safety requirements for passenger buses, including long-distance coaches and municipal transit buses.
This is a good thing. Taking the necessary measures to make them a safer means of travel.
But the committee says conflicting evidence from experts about seatbelts on school buses points to the need for further study.
Wasn’t this the concept that was utterly debunked earlier this year? Haven’t we learned that we’re better off with seatbelts than without them for all forms of road transportation, including school buses?
School buses might be a safe form of transportation now, but if there’s a way to make them safer, jump at it.
Seat belt usage on school buses, or buses in general, would be impossible to enforce. You’d never be able to assure that kids are going to stay in their seat on the bus with the seatbelt buckled for the duration of the trip.
But you would further boost their chances of survival if anything horrible did happen.
It wouldn’t be an easy process having seat belts on school buses; in fact, it would be damn expensive. Think of all the school buses in the country. Think of how expensive it would be to install seat belts. And think about how long it would take. This would need to be a long, gradual process.
But it would be best to begin the process now, rather than doing what governments tend to do, which is look at the issue ad nauseam, take their sweet time in making up their mind, and have it go through the bureaucratic channels.
Do what’s in the best interests of everyone. Approve seat belts on school buses. Make them mandatory by a certain date. Provide a significant amount of funding to ease the burden of the cost on school divisions.
Part of the reason we’re talking about seat belts on buses is because of the fallout from the Humboldt Broncos bus tragedy last year. But it’s unlikely seat belts would have changed much of the end result.
The large number of fatalities, and the severity of the injuries for the survivors, stemmed from the impact of the semi-trailer unit hitting the bus at a high rate of speed, not because of the absence of seat belts.
But it’s still time to put seat belts on buses. It was time many years ago.
All vehicles should have a seat belt for each passenger, regardless of whether it’s a car, a truck or a bus.
It’s absurd that a vehicle with more than 40 passengers aboard wouldn’t
