SCHOOL BUSES

Press, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22121, 17 June 1937, Page 12

SCHOOL BUSES

CONDEMNATION AS "DEATHTRAPS" TRANSPORT AUTHORITY'S ATTACK "APPALLING STATE OP AFFAIRS" "It is criminal that little children shoird be carried in such deathtraps as those buses are," said Mr T H Langford, No. 3 Transport Licensing Authority at a meeting of the Canterbury School Committees' Association last evening. Speaking in his capacity as a delegate to the association, Mr Langford vigorously condemned the condition of many of the buses used in various parts of the Dominion to carry children ':o schools. . "It is an appalling state of affairs," he said. "How these buses can b« allowed on the road Ido not know. ( They certainly would not get a certificate of fitness, yet the little children they carry are the most precious of freight and they travel constantly in danger of serious injury." Mr Langford said these buses did not come under his jurisdiction as a Transport Licensing Authority. He had frequently complained, unsuccessfully, of their condition, long before he was associated officially with transport. Only yesterday he ..,,. had received a report from one of y his officers on one school bus, which, certainly was not fit to be on the road This bus was a mere box with a ramshackle chassis, worth in all about £2O There was only one door into tne compartment used by the children, , which was nearly four feet off the „ ground. The exhaust pipe was rusted through for a distance of several inches, directly below the carburettor, and all that was needed ' for a tragedy was for the engine to backfire. The whole of the steering gear was in need of overhaul, one link r * being worn half-way through, by - rubbing against a tyre. Practically every mechanical feature of the car was faulty, even the two rear wheels ; being loose on the, axles. The only parts of the car not in need of over- * haul were the headlights. Some of these buses were badly overcrowded. He had seen one with 47 children in a comparatively small area. They were breedimj grounds for disease, apart from their dangerous mechanical condition. There was such trouble with buses' all over the country. The meeting decided to recom- * mend, its executive to frame a remit to the conference of the New Zea- ■" land School Committees' Associa- *« tion, drawing attention to the state'ftfc of many school buses and that something be done to improv^. ; them. „ fi s