Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask the Secretary of State for Transport, what assessment he has made of the potential merits of the proposal to increase the legal requirement to keep a child in a rear facing car seat to age 3.

The technical standards for child restraint systems used in the United Kingdom are developed by a group of experts within the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE), of which the Department for Transport is an active member.

The requirements are kept under constant review. The latest standard introduced enhanced safety provisions, including extending the requirement for child restraint systems to be only rearward facing for children up to 15 months of age.

The UNECE expert group considered extending this requirement to children of 4 years of age but decided against this having assessed a range of evidence, including biomechanical data and injury thresholds, together with consideration of ease of use and vehicle geometry.