28 July, 2005

Media statement
For immediate use

Kudos to State Insurance for Child Awareness

Every Child Counts congratulates State Insurance for testing cars to establish their driveway reversing safety. State have established a scale from 0 to 5 based on the area that is invisible to drivers when they are reversing their car, and ranked different models of cars accordingly.

“The place of their vehicles on the list should be an incentive to manufacturers to improve design to reduce the risk to small children of being run over,” says Dr Ian Hassall, Every Child Counts spokesperson. “Publicity may also be expected to remind parents of the need for vigilance, if they needed reminding.”

“Pending redesign of the family car, the surest safety measure, not so reliant on the vagaries of supervision, is likely to be a home and section design that has a free-go outdoor area for children that is separate from the driveway,” he concludes.

Every Child Counts is a coalition including Barnardos, Plunket, Save the Children, Unicef NZ and AUT’s Institute of Public Policy, supported by more than 325 other organisations and thousands of individual supporters. The public are invited to demonstrate their support for the nation’s children by adding their names to the Every Child Counts campaign at www.everychildcounts.org.nz.

ENDS

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