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Shocking TV ad aims to end 'uncool' image of seat belts

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Published Date: 04 November 2008
By ALASTAIR DALTON
TRANSPORT CORRESPONDENT
IMAGES of a driver's lungs being punctured in a car crash are featured in a harrowing new TV advert to encourage seat-belt use.
The sequence has been judged so graphic that it is being shown only after the 9pm watershed.

The campaign comes as Stewart Stevenson, the transport minister, told The Scotsman that one in six road deaths could have been averted if seat belts had
been worn.

Road safety experts said some young drivers regarded seat belts as "uncool".

The latest TV advert, shown for the first time last night, features the immediate aftermath of a collision involving a driver travelling at 30mph without his seat belt on.

It shows, in slow-motion, the driver's rib cage puncturing his lungs and tearing the main artery from his heart as they continue to be propelled forward following the impact. The driver's airbag inflates, but is insufficient to save him.

Figures for deaths among road crash victims not wearing seat belts are not published, but the government said an average of 4,000 lives and 45,000 serious injuries a year are saved in Britain by seat belts.

Young men are least likely to wear them, along with motorists on low speed, short journeys on familiar roads.

The government said some drivers wrongly believed they did not need to wear a seat belt if their car had airbags.

An edited version of the TV advert will be shown before 9pm, while the £2.6 million campaign also includes radio and cinema adverts.

Sir Jimmy Savile, who starred in the Clunk Click, Every Trip TV adverts in the 1970s, welcomed the new campaign.

He told The Scotsman: "The government must have had new figures showing a worrying decline in the wearing of seat belts. "I see this at the receiving end, working as a volunteer porter at Stoke Mandeville Hospital (in Buckinghamshire].

"It takes two seconds to be thrown through a window, but two years to put your face back together."

Stewart Stevenson, the Scottish transport minister said: "Whether it is a serious or minor road accident, seat belts are proven to save lives.

"Despite this, some drivers and their passengers are still ignoring the advice and still not buckling up.

"That is an extremely dangerous approach and one which may result in the most tragic of consequences.

"I'd urge everyone to listen to the experts.Those who do no wear a seat belt are not only gambling with their own lives, they are gambling with the lives of every other passenger in that vehicle."



The full article contains 435 words and appears in The Scotsman newspaper.
Page 1 of 1

  • Last Updated: 03 November 2008 11:40 PM
  • Source: The Scotsman
  • Location: Edinburgh
  • Related Topics: Advertising & PR
 
1

Douglas,

Bathgate 04/11/2008 08:31:28
Class warrior and croquet afficianado John Prescott seems to have a unique interpretation of the seatbelt law as scenes from his recent "documentary" seem to show. Last night he favoured the 'pull it over the right shoulder only' look and in the first programme didn't wear one at all as a passenger.
Oh yes!
2

Alternative (High-Octane) Fuel Head,

Edinburgh 04/11/2008 09:52:12
#1:

Prescott is an arrogant fool. I would expect that kind of behaviour from him.

3

EnglishHighlander,

04/11/2008 09:56:16
#2

I fully agree! I never drive without it and my car tells me if my passenger hasn't put theirs on as well. In the back, I insist on seat belts being used, otherwise we go nowhere! I don't want to die because somebody can't be ars*d wearing a seat belt!

Boy/girl racers? I've seen them driving past without their seat belts on. I often tell my wife "I wouldn't pi** on them if they were on fire" and I mean it.

Drivers south of the border may complain about all the speed cameras, but up here the reckless driving on the roads is frightening. It's about time the police came down hard on non-seatbelt wearers and the idiotic phone users etc.
4

sonofhamish,

edinburgh 04/11/2008 10:51:28
#2 and #4 while in principal I agree with both of you, there is one thing to consider. Patching up these idiots at the A&E and possibly 2 years worth of plastic and reconstructive surgery costs ALL of us money, which as we know can be a scarce thing in the NHS.
5

,

04/11/2008 11:12:27
Comment Removed By Administrator
Reason:
6

yolanda,

04/11/2008 11:18:33
I didn't realise this was a big problem. I actually thought that almost everyone, young people included, automatically put their seatbelt on when they get in a car, but it would appear that's not the case.

I wonder why there are no published figures on the number of road deaths where the lack of a seatbelt was the cause? Surely publishing these figures would add weight to the message.
7

Isonomia,

Lenzie 04/11/2008 11:50:18
Whilst the seatbelt law seemed a good idea the actual effect has been disasterous for our society. Because whilst it did save injury and lives, the effect was to legitimise the idea that governments should intervene to make life "safer". That gave the green light to the hoards of risk-averse people to create laws, rules and publicity that then encouraged everyone to believe there is a host of dangers just lurking around the corner.

Children no longer were allowed to go outside the house, kids could no longer talk to neighbours, clubs and societies like Scouts suddenly got deluged with rules and regulations and security checks on staff that drove out anyone who wasn't a form-philiac.

We now have a society where kids aren't allowed to go out to play at school if it snows, where teachers ask permission from parents for children to walk 100m to another school, and where people face arrest by PC zeolots for taking pictures of their own kids in a playpark.

Adults are now afraid of kids, kids of adults, so when kids are finally too big to keep locked up in the house, they roam the streets like feral animals with no idea how to behave because they've never been outside with an adult in their life in their own community, let alone had to speak to a stranger.
8

,

04/11/2008 12:15:18
Comment Removed By Administrator
Reason:
9

,

04/11/2008 12:58:20
Comment Removed By Administrator
Reason:
10

Alberto.,

04/11/2008 13:52:31
#"Road safety experts said some young drivers regarded seat belts as "uncool".
*****************

'Cool or Uncool' - Is it worth the gamble? Cos' if you're wrong, you could be as 'Cool as Dead' - and it don't come any cooler!

"I wish I had belted up!' could be the famous last words - you may never utter! - and, more than likely, there will not be a second chance !!!!
11

Stickman,

04/11/2008 13:56:21
People who drive, or are a passenger, in a vehicle without wearing a seatbelt are thoughtless and irresponsible, and I could not condone it. They are increasing the chances of serious or even fatal consequences. However, I would be far more scared of a nutter who thinks that they deserve to die simply for not wearing a seat belt. What a ridiculous and sick attitude.

A drunk driver, or a speeding driver, cannot possibly be put in the same category as someone who is driving without a seatbelt. In the case of the non seatbelt wearing driver, he or she is not increasing the damage they will do to another human being if they have an accident. They are putting THEMSELVES at more risk.
12

,

04/11/2008 14:17:55
Comment Removed By Administrator
Reason:
13

Suzi B,

04/11/2008 14:45:02
I must be very unimaginitive but I can't think of a reason why someone wouldn't put a their seatbelt on. Maybe they feel that it is infringing on their civil liberties to be compelled to do so. I can think of better venues for exercising their rights though.
14

Fluffy bunnies and rugby ballls,

04/11/2008 14:48:08
Simple: put your belt on. Bring back Jimmy!
15

Fluffy bunnies and rugby ballls,

04/11/2008 15:20:23
I'm sure they came out with stick on poppies to stop people from jabbing themselves last year. I wasn't imagining that, was I?
16

57vintage,

Keith 04/11/2008 15:38:08
#7

You forgot to sprinkle "nanny state", "single mothers", "back to basics", "a good clip round the ear from the local bobby", "the tawse never did me any harm", "political correctness gone mad", "got on his bike and looked for work", and "Oh Diana, why did you have to leave us, o Queen of Hearts" throughout your Daily Mail-inspired rant.

Use of the foregoing would add considerably to the entertainment value of your posts. Green ink helps too.
17

,

04/11/2008 16:19:26
Comment Removed By Administrator
Reason:
18

57vintage,

Keith 04/11/2008 16:39:28
#19

It was a politically correct black one-legged lesbian Lithuanian subsidy junkie who has come over here and stolen one of our editing jobs.

One more to chalk up for the PC brigade.
19

Daneurl,

UAE 04/11/2008 17:27:45
Instead of giving graphic displays of gore to shock the public into wearing seat belts, why not give graphic accounts on TV about violence in Iraq and Afghanistan and any other bloody place we are, so we stop invading and fighting useless wars, or graphic scenes of drug abuse and stop people taking drugs, or graphic scenes of stabbings, alcoholism, etc.?

Oh, no. That's far too silly. Lets have an advert on seat belts instead.

 

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