Self-Interest?

Sir,

Reading your comments in the April issue on the ploys of various interested bodies to wring yet more money out of car owners I was a little surprised to see that you seem to think the battle against the compulsory wearing of seat-belts was won. I don’t believe that it is. Some may hope that the money-mongers who are really behind this campaign with the help from “issue”-seeking Politicians and earnest fools — will own up. But they won’t. Chasing the buck is no chore to them. They love it Money is their whole life, and they spend all their waking hours figuring how to get more of it.

Compulsion will come because there’s money in it. Seat-belts, unworn will last forever. Worn every day they may last little more than a year and the replacement business — legally enforceable — will be immense. And that’s just the start. The next step will be compulsory fitting of rear belts as is already the case in some countries. Result: business doubled “at a stroke”, as somebody once said of something else. By the way, whatever happened to him?

 And did you know that poor vision is the cause of many crashes? Well it is. Who says so? Various spokesmen for the optical industry, that’s who. It seems they can’t sleep at night for worrying about it and the misery it’s causing, and they think that if the law would only make a lot more people buy glasses it would greatly benefit humanity. Or one section of it anyway. Want to bet stiffer eyesight tests won’t come?

E Lawless, Chiswick