A mother has admitted letting her 9-year-old daughter drive a car, but told police she planned to pull the handbrake if the child lost control.
The incident happened yesterday afternoon in Paremoremo on the North Shore - one of two examples of risky driving by Auckland motorists.
"Police received a report of a child driving a car. A mum was sitting in the passenger seat of the car, with her 9-year-old driving in the driver's seat," police said in a statement.
The pair had been on a residents-only public access road, used by other cars and considered to be a public road.
"The mum admitted letting her daughter drive and said she was going to pull the handbrake on if her daughter lost control."
After the officer explained the dangers of allowing a 9-year-old to drive a car, the mum was given a warning.
Earlier in the day, Waitemata police Sergeant Brett Campbell-Howard was patrolling Beach Haven when he noticed an SUV with a 6-metre trampoline that was only loosely tied on by a thin hessian rope.
The trampoline was hanging about 1.5m over each side of the car, which was travelling about 20 km/h.
"If he'd been going any faster the tramp would have fallen off," Campbell-Howard said.
"The driver said he was moving house and the new home was only 640 metres away, he said it was too much trouble to take the trampoline apart when he wasn't going that far.
"After I explained that the fine for an insecure load was $600 and that the trampoline could have easily come off in a gust of wind and hit a car or pedestrian, the driver agreed that his method of moving it was probably not the best way."
The driver then unloaded the trampoline and made other arrangements to transport it.
"These are two events within only a few hours of each that could have ended disastrously," Campbell-Howard said.
"We know that accidents happen but so many are preventable, and going to fatalities or serious injury cases where it's obvious that the situation could have easily been prevented are the most frustrating jobs for emergency services."
He urged motorists on a public road that were being used by other motorist to think about what could go wrong before doing something risky.