Passengers

[sirswampthing]

Morning.
I am getting confused
I still haven't made my mind up on which type of little camper to get, the main reason being, as I have two little girls (4+3) I need obviously to be able to carry two passengers. It appears that Bambi`s and Nippers have seat belts in the rear but all the ones I have seen have been rotten underneath, old age, so I am leaning more towards something with a Romahome body that I can transfer onto a newer chassis with LPG. But this is where I am being confused. Some have said its illegal to carry passengers in the back, fullstop. Vosa said if there are seat belts they must conform to regs and it will be fine, if there are no belts they said its OK as well, but my insurance company say no way Jose!, no passengers. Its my understanding they were marketed as suitable for two adults and a child in the over cab area?
So does anyone have the definitive answer please?
Thanks
Chris

[electrospanner]

Hi Chris

Having handed in my warrant card two weeks ago and no longer being an officer of the law i should know the answer to this question. It is one that comes up frequently. CAN YOU CARRY PASSENGERS IN A VEHICLE WITH NO REAR SEAT BELTS? The answer as i understand it is YES you can providing that the vehicle was built without these belts being fitted.

You as a driver however are responsible to make sure the passengers in your vehicle are under "proper" control. So if you are seen driving down the M5 with your children bouncing around in the back of your vehicle and not under control you are still comiting an offence.

With respects to the bambi and similar vehicles there is much debate as to whether seat belts are even safe in the rear as the seats are side facing anyway and in a frontal or rear collision seat belts would likely not help and they could even make the situation worse (this is my own opinion)

If your insurance company refuse cover for passengers in this or any vehicle then obviously if you flout that ruling then you are driving uninsured this would also be a no no.

Ultimately though as long as you have insurance, and as long as the van was not originally fitted with belts, the choice is yours really. The question is :: are you happy driving around without your children restrained by belts or not??

Andy

[chris (zaphod)]

Here's the legal stuff, and a short discussion.

HTH

[electrospanner]

Yep that's pretty much spot on, but to note the child PASSENGERS must be kept under control if they are not wearing belts otherwise the DRIVER is committing an offence. Not sure that every officer would be aware of this though and printing the Dot ruling Chris linked to and carrying it with you would be an idea.

Believe it or not i was pulled up on my Quad bike for not wearing a crash helmet not too long ago neither of the two officers dealing with me was aware of the law with respects to helmet wearing on quads, and neither was their sergeant!!! In fact i was detained for over 40mins whilst the relevent law was checked. During this i did not let on that i was an officer, i did tell them though that they should have checked before pulling me over whether or not i was in breach of law, as now they have ended up looking like fools!!

[sirswampthing]

It would NEVER ever happen that I would let my kids travel in a vehicle driven by myself unrestrained, and I am certain you werent implying I might, so thank you so far for your advice.
Nippers I have noticed have a different seating arrangement with as you know, one seat facing forward, which I assume would be fitted with a belt. I was further wondering if it would be possible to modify the interior of a Romahome body with some kind of proper folding/correctly belted seats? The reasoning given for it being totally a no no was that the Roma pod is not actually a permanent part of the vehicle so it would be as illegal as carrying passengers in a caravan whilst it was towed.
Atb
Chris

[electrospanner]

Jun 23, 2011 19:31:50 GMT 1 sirswampthing said:

It would NEVER ever happen that I would let my kids travel in a vehicle driven by myself unrestrained, and I am certain you werent implying I might, so thank you so far for your advice.
Nippers I have noticed have a different seating arrangement with as you know, one seat facing forward, which I assume would be fitted with a belt. I was further wondering if it would be possible to modify the interior of a Romahome body with some kind of proper folding/correctly belted seats? The reasoning given for it being totally a no no was that the Roma pod is not actually a permanent part of the vehicle so it would be as illegal as carrying passengers in a caravan whilst it was towed.
Atb
Chris

Hi Chris you are correct. I wasn't implying anything at all nor would i form any opinion on you either way. It is entirely up to you how you transport your children. For your information though, in my opinion if you were carrying passengers in the rear of a vehicle with side facing seats i think they would be safer to be unrestrained.
I certainly used my Bambi with my children in the back unrestrained, and faced criticism from some (who neither new what they were talking about, nor had any business commenting)Of course they were properly supervised and remained seated for the course of each journey. I made what i considered to be an informed decision that this was a safer way of travelling than to be belted in to side facing seats.

In fact i went further than this even. When we got our bambi the previous owner had fitted rear seat belts into the living area. On examination, consideration and on advice from experts we removed these belts, as it was considered on balance to be safer without them. ( I stress these were not original belts but were added by the previous owner)

I am not one of the "anti seat belt" brigade either i have seen first hand so many times where seat belts have saved lives, conversly though i have also seen cases where seatbelts have ended lives, on balance though there is no doubt that you stand a better chance of surviving a head on collision if you are wearing a seatbelt.

Ironically one of the families highly critical of us for allowing our children to travel without restraint in the back of our bambi climbed into their own VW camper van after strapping in their two young children, both climbed into the front seats and each lit up a cigarette Now that in my humble opinion is hypocrisy in its highest form. And when i pointed this out to them they seemed to get really aggressive

I've rambled here a bit i know. However Chris please rest assured i was not trying to imply anything at all, I have no doubt that as you are giving this so much thought you are doubtless a responsible parent, who cares very much about the safety of his own, in this day and age that is becoming a rare quality, so good on you for it

Andy