What they said ... `Coach travel is the safest form of land travel you can have and is safer even than rail' Mr Kevin Norris, executive director of the Bus Proprietors' Association
`For too long the Government has been saying the system is OK as it is, but it isn't' Mrs Jacki West, whose son was dragged 900 metres by a school bus
In March, 1998, the Victorian Government announced that it would undertake a school bus safety review.
Over a number of years there have been calls for improved safety measures on school buses and for alterations to the road laws to afford greater protection to school children alighting from buses.
There is not, however, complete agreement among all interest groups as to what measures should be taken. It remains to be seen what changes will be made as a result the Victorian review.
There is also some pressure for a co-ordinated, national approach to school bus safety.
Background
Some 70,000 Victorian school children use school buses each day. A larger number use school buses in New South Wales.
Calls for improved school bus safety have come from a range of sources. A number of coroners have made recommendations as to how bus travel might be made safer for school children.
In November 1997, following the deaths of four Victorian school children over the previous five months, the Herald Sun began a campaign urging improved visibility for buses, the installation of seatbelts and alterations to the road laws which would require traffic to either slow or stop in the vicinity of a stationary school bus. Some 1,400 people supported the campaign conducted by The Herald Sun.
Other campaigners for improved bus safety include the New South Wales-based HOPE (Helping Our Pedestrians Everywhere), the Victorian Federation of State School Parents' Clubs, the Victorian Secondary Principals' Association and individual bus safety campaigners such as Mr Leon Hain.
As part of its proposed bus safety review the Victorian Government is considering requiring buses travelling in both directions to stop in the vicinity of parked school buses. It is also considering having safety messages broadcast as children are about to alight from buses.
There have also been calls for a national approach to school bus safety, similar to that adopted in the United States.
Campaigners have compared Australia's bus safety record unfavourably with that of the United States.
In the United States more than 23 million children take a school bus every day. Yet in the 1995-6 school year only 25 children were killed in school bus accidents.
Bus proprietors do not, however, support all the possible additional safety features that have been proposed for buses . Nor is there universal agreement that altering road laws would necessarily increase children's safety.
There are a number of Internet sites that consider the question of school bus safety.
One of the most extensive Australian sites that looks at this issue has been established by Attwood Marshall Lawyers.
The site has a valuable collection of school bus safety resources.
The resource collection has an interesting introduction written by Rob Davis, a lawyer who represented the bus company involved following a Queensland bus crash which resulted in 11 deaths and 30 injuries.
The resource collection includes a number of detailed survey results and concludes with a series of recommendations.
The site's home page reproduces other comments of Rob Davis titled, School bus campaign goes national.
This site argues for improvements to bus safety. A comparable site presenting a differing point of view could not readily be found.
Arguments suggesting school buses are sufficiently safe
On the question of installing seatbelts in school buses, bus proprietors generally argue that such a move is not necessary as school bus travel is already safe.
Kevin Norris, executive director of the Bus Proprietors' Association, has claimed that a Sydney University study indicated that travel to school by bus was seven times safer than in a car, 31 times safer than walking and 228 times safer than riding a bike.
Mr Norris has claimed, `Coach travel is the safest form of land travel you can have and is safer even than rail.'
Mr Norris concluded, `I am yet to see figures that show that fitting seatbelts adds to the safety of buses.'
It has also been claimed that fitting seatbelts in school buses may actually pose a safety hazard.
Mr Norris has maintained, `The seatbelt material is such that, in a collision, the G-forces created would cause the webbing to cut passengers in half.
Further, it has been claimed, not only is the addition of seatbelts to school buses not necessary it is not practical. Those who hold this view maintain that the cost of supplying and attaching belts to all school bus seats would be more than the industry could afford.
Mr Norris has claimed, `There is not enough capital in the industry to supply schools with the type of equipment they are asking for.'
According to this line of argument, if school buses were required to be fitted with seat belts, some buses would have to be withdrawn from the road and some school buses services would cease to operate.
Mr Norris has claimed that if the fitting of seat belts were made mandatory the resulting contraction of school bus services would be likely to mean that there would be fewer excursions for students.
With regard to altering road rules to protect children alighting from school buses, it has been claimed that this may not be effective.
Some of those who hold this view argue that many accidents involving school children alighting from school buses occur not because of deficiencies in the road laws but because the child injured or killed was not sufficiently careful.
This view was expressed by a Victoria Police spokesperson after the death of a child in 1997.
The police spokesperson claimed that the accident was a tragic example of a child not looking properly before crossing the road after stepping from the blind side of a school bus.
On the question of whether traffic should have to stop or slow in the vicinity of a stationary school bus, it has been claimed that this may either be impractical or create greater hazards than it is intended to remove.
The Victorian transport Minister, Mr Robin Cooper, has claimed that it would be difficult to impose uniform regulations requiring all traffic to stop or slow as school buses sometimes moved in traffic travelling at up to 100kmh.
On the question of whether flashing lights, signs or other devices should be used to ensure that school buses were more visible, there are those who argue that the current provisions are sufficient.
In November, 1997, a spokesperson for the Victorian Transport Minister, Mr Robin Cooper, assured parents that it was enough warning to motorists that stationary school buses turned on their hazard lights as children boarded or stepped off buses.
It has also been suggested that any change in the law or modification to make buses more visible would not be effective without the co-operation of motorists.
Mr Kevin Norris has claimed, `Real benefits will not come until people understand the dangers involved and modify their behaviour.'
In September, 1996. Mr Norris has stated, `All accidents involving the death of school children in Victoria have occurred because of bad habits by motorists or children and parents at bus stops.'
This view was also expressed in a ruling the Supreme Court in Brisbane in April, 1998. In this ruling Justice Ambrose found the motorist was negligent for travelling at a speed of 60 to 65km/h past a school bus, when he should `reasonably have foreseen' that a child might obstruct the car's path.
Justice Ambrose also decided, `That negligence in my view was exacerbated by [his] failure to give any warning of his approach by sounding his horn well before he ... commenced to drive past the bus.'
Arguments suggesting that school buses are not sufficiently safe
One of the main reasons offered for the mandatory installation of seatbelts on school buses is that they would increase children's chances of survival in the event of an accident.
Mr David Loader, commenting as the principal of Methodist Ladies College, claimed that though buses' accident record is good, when accidents do occur passenger injuries are severe.
It has been claimed that a 1991 Review of Bus Safety for the Victorian Minister of Transport indicated that 38 per cent of major injury claims for bus travellers were for head and face injuries.
Mr Loader has claimed that legislating for school buses to be fitted with seatbelts and requiring students to wear them would reduce the chances of such injuries if an accident occurred.
The claim has also been made that if the law requires passengers in private cars to wear seatbelts then it should also require their being worn on school buses.
It has been claimed that that this duty of care is particularly important when the safety of children is being considered.
Mr Loader has noted, `When parents take their children out in their car they first ensure that the children are properly belted in their seats in case of an accident.
The same logic applies to schools and the same responsibility lies with those taking students on excursions.'
Mr Loader has argued that bus companies should apply Australian Design Rules 66 and 68, which give specifications for padding, stronger seat anchorages and retractable lap and sash seatbelts, to school buses.
One of the reasons offered for altering road laws to protect children travelling on school buses is the number of children who are killed or injured while alighting from these buses.
A campaign was launched by The Herald Sun in November, 1997, after four Victorian children were killed in these circumstances during a five month period. A further three had been killed in 1996 after getting off a school bus.
In June, 1996, an article was published in the Medical Journal of Australia which noted that 17 New South Wales children had died over a nine year period in accidents which occurred as they stepped from a bus and attempted to cross the road.
American studies also apparently support the claim that the greatest risk to children travelling on school buses occurs in what they refer to as the "loading zone" where children are getting on or off the bus.
Many American states apparently require traffic travelling in both directions either to stop or slow in the vicinity of a stationary school bus.
A New South Wales coroner, J S Williams, reporting on the death of a five-year old boy, concluded, `The only practical recommendation that may have saved [this child's] life is ... a requirement that vehicles travelling in both directions on two-lane roads stop when a school bus is disembarking students.'
Coroner Williams made this recommendation regarding vehicles being required to stop to the New South Wales Transport Minister.
There are also suggestions that school buses be made more visible better to alert motorists to the potential hazard.
As one of his recommendations, Coroner Williams also stated that the benefit of the standard flashing hazard lights `must be doubted when applied to school buses'.
Some of the visibility measures employed in the United States include school buses with neon signs or flashing lights which signal when they are pulling up and are stationary. Some are also fitted with a stop sign that protrudes on the traffic side when the bus stops. All apparently have standard `school bus' and `caution children' livery to increase driver recognition and all are painted a colour known as `national school bus glossy yellow'.
In addition, it has been suggested that school buses be fitted with safety booms or arms which physically prevent children running out in front of buses from which they have just alighted. Some states in the United States require school buses be equipped with such booms.
These safety measures have meet with the support of the Bus Association of Victoria.
Mr Kevin Norris, the executive director of the Bus Association of Victoria, has indicated that his association would support any realistic trial.
Commenting on the feasibility of some of the measures proposed, Mr Norris observed that special big flashing lights and pop-out stop or danger signs may only cost `a few hundred dollars to install.'
Further implications
It is not possible, at this stage, to indicate what changes, if any, will result from Victoria's school bus safety review.
The measures apparently being considered involve requiring traffic to stop in the vicinity of a stationary school bus and having safety messages broadcast to children as they alight from school buses.
There have been doubts expressed about the probable effectiveness of requiring all cars to stop near parked school buses and this may not go ahead.
A powerful augment in favour of this measure is its apparent effectiveness in the United States. It remains to be seen, however, whether it will be judged necessary to introduce similar measures here.
On the question of safety modifications to school buses, it seems possible that having buses play safety messages as children alight may be adopted, as may the affixing of additional warning lights and signs to school buses and perhaps the installation of restraining booms to halt children about to cross in front of stopped buses. Bus proprietors have indicated a willingness to consider such measures.
It seems unlikely, however, that seat belts will become mandatory on school buses. Bus proprietors have claimed that the cost of installing seat belts would force the reduction of services. While deaths of children in accidents aboard school buses occur so infrequently, it seems probable that school bus proprietors will continue to argue that fitting seat belts is unnecessary.
Sources The Herald Sun
2/9/96 page 9 news item by Tanya Taylor, `School bus seatbelt row'
2/9/96 page 18 comments by David Loader and Kevin Norris, `Should all school buses be fitted with seat belts?'
2/11/97 page 5 news item by Murray Johnson, `Young lives lost in a flash'
2/11/97 page 5 news item, `US bus safety a science'
2/11/97 page 44 editorial, `Let's change bus laws'
4/11/97 page 11 news item by Paul Anderson, `Death sparks bus rule plea'
9/11/97 page 10 news item, `US law leads the way'
9/11/97 page 10 news item by Murray Johnson, `Groups back bus reforms'
9/11/97 page 11 news item by Murray Johnson, `Rural route a reason to worry'
8/2/98 page 23 news item by Murray Johnson, `Coroner reopens bus-death inquiry'
29/3/98 page 15 news item by David Wilson, `Bus plan stops traffic'
28/3/98 page 15 news item, `Campaigners welcome safety review'
8/4/98 page 10 news item by Kim Wilson, `Driver shares death blame'
The Australian
4/4/98 page 3 news item by Megan Saunders and Christopher Niesche, `Drivers, bus firm liable for girl's life'
8/4/98 page 7 news item by Benjamin Haslem, `Girl's bus too far from safe crossing'
Internet
There are a number of sites that consider the question of school bus safety. One of the most extensive Australian sites that looks at this issue has been established by Attwood Marshall Lawyers.
The site has a valuable collection of school bus safety resources. These can be accessed at http://www.attwoodmarshalllawyers.com.au/Schoolbus.html
The resource collection has an interesting introduction written by Rob Davis, a lawyer who represented the bus company involved following a Queensland bus crash which resulted in 11 deaths and 30 injuries.
The resource collection includes a number of detailed survey results and concludes with a series of recommendations.
The site's home page reproduces other comments of Rob Davis titled, School bus campaign goes national. It can be found at http://www.attwoodmarshalllawyers.com.au/BUS.HTM
This site argues for improvements to bus safety. A comparable site presenting a differing point of view could not readily be found.
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