BOY'S DEATH

Evening Post, Volume CXXVI, Issue 153, 2 December 1938, Page 8

BOY'S DEATH

SCHOOL BUS CONDEMNED

COMMENT BY CORONER

(By relegrapb—Press Association.) BLENHEIM, This Day,

Returning a verdict at an inquest that John William Barr, aged 7, died as a result of head injuries received in a fall from a moving school bus near Seddon on November 21, the Coroner (Mr. E. J. Hill) added a rider condemning the vehicle concerned as unsuitable for the purpose of the conveyance of young children. The Coroner said he cauld not see that the driver of the bus was blameworthy. If there was blame it was tne method of transport of the children. There was much need for an improvement. He undertook to forward a recommenda-tion-to the Transport Department that vehicles of such type should not be licensed for the purpose for which this bus was used.

The evidence disclosed that the bus was a light delivery van with a canvas hood but open\at the back except for a 17£-inch tailboard.

Alexander Carlyle Reilly, driver, son of a contractor, J. Anderson Keilly, Seddon, said that the bus was occupied by ten children between the ages of five and thirteen. There was no adult with them and he was seated In the cab entirely separated from the children, who could communicate with him only by tapping on the cab window, which was a fixture. If he needed to communicate with them he had to stop and get out. On the day of the accident he inadvertently drove past the deceased's gate. On pulling up 40 yards beyond he went to tell the children to sit still while he backed to the gate but found that Barr had jumped out. The vehicle was licensed by the Transport Department on October 6.

A schoolgirl aged 12 said in evidence that when the bus did not stop Barr threw something out and then put his foot on the tailboard and jumped out. Nobody suggested he do it and he was not pushed.

The Coroner added a rider to Ms verdict drawing the attention of the Department responsible to. the fact that in his opinion the vehicle involved, although licensed, was quite unsuitable for the conveyance of young children and that the absence of control by the driver and the open back guarded only by a low tailboard should disqualify such vehicle from receiving a certificate of fitness for the purpose for which it was used. He submitted that the matter was one meriting immediate attention by a revision of the system or regulation which, permitted such vehicles to be employed, not only in Seddon, but in other districts in New Zealand.