Dashcams are a better option to improve safety

Readers discuss how to improve road safety. Other topics: CEO leadership and noisy jet skis.

Readers discuss drivers photographing unrestrained children in cars. Delores Johnson / The National

While I share the very serious concerns regarding child safety in cars (Police call on UAE residents to photograph children not buckled up in cars, September 4), I cannot agree that the practical way forward is for members of the public using smartphones or other hand-held devices taking photographs of unrestrained children in cars.

What I can envisage is this causing even more carnage on the roads from individuals trying to take these photographs, and even the possibility of violence between the parties.

Dashcams – wide-angle cameras mounted inside the car that continuously record the front and rear views – are a better option because no intervention from the driver is required.

I have two on my vehicle. In the event of a collision, the combined evidence of high-definition video, photographs, sound, GPS location and other information is available to the police so they can determine which driver is at fault.

I have reported drivers to the police on a number of occasions and the use of dashcams would be a very important tool in the Dubai Police’s “We are all police” campaign. They should have a place where drivers can upload dashcam footage of dangerous driving.

If these cameras are used to help the police, I believe it would be a major step forward for road safety.

However, these cameras cannot see into the large proportion of cars with windows tinted darker than the 30 per cent permitted under UAE law. How can the police enforce the law when they have no idea what is happening inside a large proportion of vehicles?

Another important step would be the introduction of more unmarked police cars with cameras to the front, back and sides, recording incidents such as tailgating, dangerous lane-changing and unsafe loads.

Ian Evans, Ras Al Khaimah

Another option would be to put posters in all the main languages on petrol pumps, describing the safety benefits of properly restraining children in cars and also outlining the penalties for those who fail to comply.

If you have enough money to keep a car on the road, then you can afford a car seat. If you have a driving licence, then you must have a certain amount of common sense.

Niamh Foran, Dubai

How about mandatory reporting by school officials and teachers, many of whom pledge to protect children?

Do hospitals have mandatory car-seat checks before discharging babies at the hospital?

Asking civilians to take an active role to photograph and report may not be the best solution, especially when many are driving themselves when they witness this kind of thing.

There are lots of other ways to help educate.

Name withheld by request

The law said my child had to be in a car seat until she weighed about 36kg. She’s like a bean pole and was almost as tall as me by the time she weighed that, which meant a car seat and/or booster seat would be ridiculously unsafe.

So, we disobeyed the law and put her into a seat belt, as anyone her size should be. My grandmother was half her size and nobody was saying she had to be in a booster seat.

As for drivers taking photographs of unrestrained children in nearby cars, I think anyone who snapped a photograph while they are driving should have it submitted as evidence against them in support of a charge of distracted driving.

Name withheld by request

The best CEOs ‘walk the talk’

After reading The virtues of management by walking around (September 4), I think this kind of participative management is a sign of the best CEOs.

They take time to visit their employees and are usually the most successful in motivating them to perform. Any leader who walks the talk will earn the respect of the people.

We are only true leaders if others see us as their leaders. Nobody should think they are a leader simply because they’ve been given a top position.

Randall Mohammed, Dubai

How disruptive are jet skis?

With regard to your news report, Noisy jet-skiers continue to disturb Abu Dhabi residents (September 4), I phone the coastguard regularly about this issue but the jet skiers never seem to actually get caught.

They traumatise us with the constant noise.

We also have had them riding after midnight on several occasions and it’s not fair that 10 people can cause this much problem to so many residents.

Carol Goodey, Abu Dhabi

A disturbance? Seriously?

You guys are destroying all the fun.

Syed Humail Gohar, Abu Dhabi