Rules relating to passengers
If you have read the page about driver licensing, you will know that - perhaps surprisingly - up to eight passengers may be carried in a bus or coach over 30 years old driven on an ordinary full car licence. However the rest of this page assumes the driver is qualified.
If a bus or coach was not originally fitted with seat belts, there is no obligation to fit them to vehicles built before 1996 except if used for organised trips involving three or more children under 14 - that includes private trips and school runs. When I acquired 'Mary', she had belts fitted because she had last been used for schools duties but mostly they were in a parlous state. Some were inertia-reel, which couldn't have worked properly threaded through the cushions of seats never designed for belts. I identified eight good belts, which served me prior to passing my test, and subsequently obtained and fitted the remaining 45...not a cheap exercise!
Not a cosmetic exercise, either, for 'Mary' had at least had the correct work done for pre-1996 vehicles to strengthen the seat mountings to accept belts.
But vehicles of any age used solely for 'bus' work - public stage-carriage services on routes not exceeding 50km - do not have to have belts fitted.
Where seat belts are fitted, the law is not very logical, especially regarding small children and appropriate restraints; too much to go into here. However as my grandchildren featured heavily in my decision to buy an old coach anyway, it would have been inconsistent not to fit belts to all seats.
Without putting out-of-place signs on each seat-back, I am legally obliged to announce the requirement to wear them. I also demonstrate how to use them. Once that is done, the legal responsibility to comply passes to the passenger.
Of course, once my back is turned I have little control over belt-wearing anyway and there is no law preventing passengers from moving around the vehicle. I have been told that making seat belts compulsory was as much about reducing such movement and consequent potential chaos as it was about holding people secure in the event of an accident, an extremely rare event in any case.
To me it makes sense to be held in place and I suspect an insurer might resist settlement where for example someone un-belted is thrown from the vehicle while everyone else was belted in. I always wear my belt.
There are no laws regarding comfort breaks for passengers. Many modern coaches have toilets and washrooms; and a driver may drive for up to four-and-a-half hours non-stop.
One specific rule for coach operation is that on journeys to and from football matches, alcohol may not be consumed.
But of course there is no intention to use 'Mary' in either of these ways.
If a bus or coach was not originally fitted with seat belts, there is no obligation to fit them to vehicles built before 1996 except if used for organised trips involving three or more children under 14 - that includes private trips and school runs. When I acquired 'Mary', she had belts fitted because she had last been used for schools duties but mostly they were in a parlous state. Some were inertia-reel, which couldn't have worked properly threaded through the cushions of seats never designed for belts. I identified eight good belts, which served me prior to passing my test, and subsequently obtained and fitted the remaining 45...not a cheap exercise!
Not a cosmetic exercise, either, for 'Mary' had at least had the correct work done for pre-1996 vehicles to strengthen the seat mountings to accept belts.
But vehicles of any age used solely for 'bus' work - public stage-carriage services on routes not exceeding 50km - do not have to have belts fitted.
Where seat belts are fitted, the law is not very logical, especially regarding small children and appropriate restraints; too much to go into here. However as my grandchildren featured heavily in my decision to buy an old coach anyway, it would have been inconsistent not to fit belts to all seats.
Without putting out-of-place signs on each seat-back, I am legally obliged to announce the requirement to wear them. I also demonstrate how to use them. Once that is done, the legal responsibility to comply passes to the passenger.
Of course, once my back is turned I have little control over belt-wearing anyway and there is no law preventing passengers from moving around the vehicle. I have been told that making seat belts compulsory was as much about reducing such movement and consequent potential chaos as it was about holding people secure in the event of an accident, an extremely rare event in any case.
To me it makes sense to be held in place and I suspect an insurer might resist settlement where for example someone un-belted is thrown from the vehicle while everyone else was belted in. I always wear my belt.
There are no laws regarding comfort breaks for passengers. Many modern coaches have toilets and washrooms; and a driver may drive for up to four-and-a-half hours non-stop.
One specific rule for coach operation is that on journeys to and from football matches, alcohol may not be consumed.
But of course there is no intention to use 'Mary' in either of these ways.