Truckies told safety's a belter

LAWRENCE GULLERY
Police and ACC are hoping more truck drivers will belt up as they encourage transport companies to install seat belts in their trucks.
Drivers must wear a seat belt if one is fitted in their truck. Some older trucks did not have seat belts fitted when they were manufactured.
ACC hope to change that and its campaign with the police will include messages on billboards, truck backs and posters to promote the campaign. It will give out high-visibility seat-belt covers to help police identify those wearing seat belts.
The police commercial vehicle investigation unit also plans to up the ante on drivers caught with an unfastened seat belt.
The fine for not wearing one or allowing a person under 15 to travel unrestrained is $150 for each seatbelt not worn. David Jones, manager of David Jones Motors, in Hastings, said installing belts into trucks could be difficult if there were no mounting points for them. Installation of belts in trucks which had the mounting points took only about an hour, while those without took longer.
"The trucks that don't have mounts, we're talking about older trucks (pre) '97. Some of them have mounts for lap belts but no mounts for diagonal belts."
Mr Jones said his business would install belts in trucks about 15 times a year.
Operations manager for Emerson Container Transport Garry Parson said all eight trucks in his fleet had seat belts.
"It's our policy for drivers to wear seat belts and it's the law that if the trucks have seat belts they have to wear them," he said.
Mr Parson has worked for the container transport firm for 15 years and said other transport companies with older trucks should have belts fitted: "There's a safety issue here."
Mr Parson said his drivers had no problems wearing seat belts.
"I think what frightens them is that if they are found not wearing seat belts a $150 fine will be put on them," he said.
Farmers Transport's Hastings branch manager Bill Wilson said he could not see the difference between wearing a seat belt in a car and wearing one in a truck.
"If you hit something in a truck you've got nowhere to go but forward," he said.
All of the trucks in the Hastings fleet, about 40, had belts, he said.