MCCF agreement with TCM over education project

On Saturday, 18th March, the President of Touring Club Malta Perit Mannie Galeas signed an agreement with the Malta Community Chest Fund Foundation about the education Project called “Investing in a safe education and environment” .

This education project is aimed for young generation at the primary and secondary schools and is going to focus on providing information and awareness of road safety on the Maltese islands with the objective of creating more safe driving awareness for our young generation.

This education project is under the category of Ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all part of the Fund for Voluntary Organisations under the initiative taken by the Malta Community Chest Fund Foundation to support the community in Malta through different initiatives and schemes taken by the same Foundation.

This education project is coordinated by the Touring Club Malta in collaboration with the Department of Education and the Malta Road Safety Council. The project provides educational pre- sentations and workshops on road safety to students. The presentation and training focus is on pedestrian, passenger and wheels safety, as well as on future drivers. The project is planned to start this very month of April and be completed by December 2018. This is a two –year education project where the education advisors of Touring Club Malta Alex Borg and Marica Azzopardi will be going around Malta and Gozo doing presentations and provide information about the road safety.

This is the first time for Touring Club Malta to co-ordinated such a project on a national scale for all Year 5 students at the primary schools and Form 2 students at the secondary schools. Based on the European Union road safety policy http://ec.europa.eu/transport/ro ad_safety/home_en on safe driving, there is need to create awareness, information and education for students at primary and secondary schools. Children are particularly vulnerable.

Each year, more than 800 children under the age of 15 are killed on European roads and 100 000 are injured. Under EU law, seat belts must be used in all vehicles. Children over 1.35 m can use an adult seat belt. Those under 1.35 m must use equipment appropriate to their size and weight when travelling in cars or lorries.

It is now against the law to use a rear-facing child seat on the front passenger seat – unless the airbag has been deactivated. Although walking is great for your health and the environment - and especially practical for children - pedestrians are much more vulnerable to accidents than other road users.

There are simple things we can all do to help keep our roads safe. It’s reckoned that, if everybody fastened their seatbelt, respected speed limits, and didn’t drive under the influence of alcohol, we could save more than 12 000 lives a year on European roads.