Should seatbelts be mandatory on all forms of transport?

Each week our two teenagers debate a hot topic. This week ...

Dennis Wu, 17, St Joseph's College

I think it's fair to say that most of us agree that seatbelts, if properly worn, could save lives in accidents. However, while seatbelts are feasible on vehicles like private cars, taxis and minibuses, it is harder to bring them in on some other forms of transport. For instance, how are we going to introduce seatbelts to the MTR, one of the most widely used forms of transport in Hong Kong?

City-dwellers like you and me know very well how painful it is to travel during rush hours, with the long queues and ridiculous waiting times. Introducing seatbelts would only aggravate the situation. Instead of just getting up and walking off the train when it arrives at a station, passengers would have to first unfasten their seatbelts. That may not seem much but on the grand scale this would mean more train delays.

I have no doubt that seatbelts are needed on taxis and minibuses because of the ludicrous speeds drivers tend to drive at, but are they really necessary on trains? Accidents aren't frequent and on those few occasions they do occur, seatbelts would not have helped. The procedures and controls of railways are fully automated, meaning a crash involving two trains is extremely unlikely.

Seatbelts do save lives but they aren't always useful. If this is to be done it should be done on a case by case basis instead of mandating all companies to introduce them.