Infant car seats shortage coming due to new rules

The new regulation for child car seats is raising concerns for parents and manufacturers. As of January child car seats will have to be bigger to accommodate bigger babies and toddlers. The new seats need to be tested, but there isn't the staff or facilities to get the job done in time.

CTV Toronto: Naomi Parness on the seat shortage

There are new rules coming for children's car seats, but manufacturers are saying they might not be able to meet demand. Naomi Parness reports.

CTV News Channel: Kathy Buckworth, author

A parenting author discusses the concerns parents are having with the new car seat regulations, and explains how long they can continue to use the old car seats.

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In this Dec. 18, 2009 photo, Anne Epperson unbuckles her daughter Madeline, age 3, from her car seat at their home. (AP / Charlie Riedel)

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CTV.ca News Staff

Date: Mon. Nov. 22 2010 9:03 PM ET

Parents in Canada could be facing a shortage of car seats in the new year as new design regulations take effect.

Car seats are about to get bigger because of the new safety regulations from Transport Canada. The seats will be widened and lengthened and the weight limits will rise, so that babies will stay in rear-facing infant seats until they reach 10 kilograms (up from the current nine), while weight limits for forward-facing seats will rise to 30 kilograms, up from 22.

The new seats will also have more padding to accommodate the new generation of chubby babies.

The changes are driven in part by the fact children have gotten heavier over the past two decades.

"The babies are bigger and longer and when they're rear facing when they're an infant, their feet have a tendency to touch the back seat," Gad Bensabath of Pinkiblue, a Montreal store that specializes in products for babies and toddlers, told CTV.

The changes will also put Canada's regulations in line with those of the U.S.

After Jan. 1, 2011, car seat manufacturers will only be permitted to sell seats that comply with the new standards. While parents will still be able to use their current car seats after the new regulations take effect, it's expected that many will choose to wait for the new car seats rather than use seats they may perceive as "outdated."

That build-up in demand could spark a shortage of car seats early next year, said Glen Cockburn of Britax, a stroller and car seat manufacturer.

"There hasn't been enough time for a lot of manufacturers to get compliant with the new regulations," he said.

Delays in testing the new car seats have compounded the problem. Canada has only one qualified compliance testing centre to approve new car seat models, and the location is booked until mid-March. Another testing facility was recently set up in Montreal, but it's not fully up and running.

As a result, companies likely won't be able to get enough car seats on to store shelves early next year.

That's left manufacturers and retailers lobbying the government for more time to comply with the regulations.

Comments are now closed for this story

Andrea in Sioux Lookout
said
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It shocks me to see how many people, and apparently parents, are unaware of child safety seat laws. The manufacturer puts a useful life date on the seat even though it isn't required by regulation. One of the main reasons they do this is for people who are buying a used seat as the history or condition of the car seat or booster cushion becomes hard to check (was it in an accident, was it stored in a place or in a way that caused damage to parts, etc.?) Also as I understand children can still start using seat belts once they meet ANY ONE of the following: child turns 8 yrs old; child weighs 80 lbs; or child is 145 cm tall in Ontario. In Manitoba I believe it is just the height requirement. I think the new regulations are a great idea, anything that will keep our children safe. Parents can still use their current car seat, but stores will only be selling the new 'bigger' ones. This does not mean everyone has to run out and buy all new seats for the sole purpose of padding the gov't pockets with even more HST as one comment suggests. I don't understand why parents are so against having a safer seat for their child, in my opinion they should be glad safer regulations are coming out, this is for your child's safety.

Buck
said
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So let me get this straight. Too many parents are feeding their kids too many cookies and letting them watch too much TV and get fat, so my kids who eat healthy and are active have to stay in car seats longer than they really need to? As it is right now, my son who is in SK is technically supposed to be in an infant seat still, based soley on weight....thats just wrong! How about the government starts targeting parents who feed their kids nothing but crap while letting them be couch potatoes instead! Typical government, go after the people who aren't causing the problem.

Claude
said
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BC has had the Car Seat Law since July 2008 and people have adapted. Who believers their kids should float free in a car today is nuts.. Yes 25 to 35 years ago, when I was a kid, we had no seat belt law but we also had 22 million people in Canada with most of them owning one car per family and made like a tank. It still wasn't safe and many kids paid the price but todays tin cars are even worse and that scares me when my kids are in with me. Force the Companies to make these properly and recyclable would only make sense but "Non-believers" want cheap stuff that their kids would probably be better off in a paper bag then a $20.00 booster seat, which should never pass Transport Canada Approvals. This is after all our kids safety we are protecting..

Nate from Ontario
said
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Just more ways to make us poorer! Tax us to death, then make us update our seats so they can get more of our tax dollars (HST).

Shea
said
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To further Bob's point, bigger car seats may mean bigger cars. I currently drive a small crossover and have three kids, one in a car seat and two in boosters. My kid's safety seats are an extremely tight fit, even an added half inch would force me to purchase a larger, and most likely less efficient, vehicle. If over weight kids are prompting the change then I don't think smaller car seats should be removed because some of still have small kids, mine are all skinny so why should I have to change?

Lz in Edmonton
said
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I am SO glad that my kids are now almost out of the CAR seat age. The car seats now are like little jet safety carriages that restrict movement and are hard to sit on even with cushion, that it makes any car trip a painful exprience for child and parent alike. I just wish some politicians had to sit in some of them seats for 3 to 6 hours and see how they like riding in them.

Nobody
said
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I don't understand the rationale here. Car seat safety was based mainly one size, weight and height. Was the 22 kg limit not good enough? Based on what?The fact that children are bigger is nonsense. Car crashes don't ask for age. Size matters.Is that another law to create demand?

Doug # BC
said
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Why anyone would want to manufacture these car seats in the first place? Companies make a good faith effort to build them,10 years later somone doesn't follow maintenance and usage recommendations,a child gets killed or injured, and all the profits go to a multi million dollar law suit. Yes.I know that the best of parents and the best of drivers do have accidents.But really,the way some people drive when they have children in their cars is disgusting.As is the way people take short cuts so their childs seat "looks" like it is installed correctly,when in fact,it is not.How about a law against being "felony stupid".

JASON IN SASK
said
0 0

I feel safer having my kids butt firmly in place on the seat of my truck. Neither of them even activate the air bag. These "new" seats are another form of panic instilled by the government to get people to keep spending money they don't have. People should also stop the problem of "heavier" kids at the source, have the kids eat healthier and exercise more.

still using only one seat on planes
said
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Add it to the list...One more thing that has to change because of rampant obesity. We need bigger car seats so obese parents can put their obese kids in the car to get more junk food. I can't even buy pants for my average-sized kid because they are all "husky" now.

sscott
said
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So what. Half the car seats on the market are more of a danger to children than if you didn't use one to begin with.

bob
said
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This is going to create an even bigger environmental problem than we already have due to car seats. They "expire" after just a few years and Canada has no recycling program so we end up with millions of them in landfills. This needs to be addressed.

Windex
said
0 0

Question: Is Ontario government changing the laws to go with the new regulations? Or are these new regulations just there for the preschoolers who are heavy? My 7 year-old does not even weight 60 pounds yet.

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