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Question and Answer Tracking Details

324 - SCHOOL BUS SERVICES IN THE KIAMA ELECTORATE

Ward, Gareth to the Minister for Regional Transport and Roads

With respect to school bus services in the Kiama Electorate:

(1) How many school bus routes use buses that don’t have seat belts?

(2) How many children are traveling to school from the Kiama Electorate who travel on buses without seat belts?

(3) When will all school buses in the Kiama Electorate have seat belts?
Answer -
SCHOOL BUS SERVICES IN THE KIAMA ELECTORATE

I am advised

(1 - 2) The former Liberal National Government did not establish processes to capture data in the format requested.

(3) The independently chaired Rural and Regional Seatbelt Program Taskforce established under the former Uber-National Government determined that seatbelts are required only on dedicated school buses in Rural and Regional NSW. There are 46 buses operated under Rural and Regional Bus Service Contracts in the Kiama electorate, comprising of:

  • 36 buses with seatbelts fitted;
  • 10 low floor, regular route buses which are not included in the Rural and Regional School Bus Seatbelts Program.

The NSW Rural and Regional School Bus Seatbelts Program was extended to selected outer metropolitan areas where some outer metropolitan school buses travel along some of the same high-risk roads as the Rural and Regional school buses.

Transport for NSW has determined the school bus routes to receive seatbelts based on careful analysis of roads with higher risk ratings, with seatbelts to be installed on buses which regularly travel on roads outside urban areas over longer distances with a speed limit of 80 kilometres an hour and above. No additional school routes in Kiama were identified as meeting the criteria for requiring seatbelts.

Question asked on 25 May 2023 (session 58-1) and printed in Questions & Answers Paper No. 6
Answer received on 29 June 2023 and printed in Questions & Answers Paper No. 15

The Parliament of New South Wales acknowledges and respects the traditional lands of all Aboriginal people, and pays respects to all Elders past and present. We acknowledge the Gadigal people as the traditional custodians of the land on which the Parliament of New South Wales stands.