Texaco's Bronagh Carron holds copies of five booklets being distributed free of charge through participating service stations under a new road safety initiative aimed at children between the ages of 6 and 10 years which has been launched by Texaco in Ireland.

Texaco in Ireland has launched an initiative aimed at helping parents to teach road safety to their young children. Targeted at boys and girls between the ages of six and ten years, the idea revolves around a series of five booklets in which the road safety message is told through the adventures of an imaginary character called 'Oscar'.

Each booklet uses comic book drawings and language to highlight an aspect of road safety that children can apply in their own lives. Subjects covered include: understanding road signs, using pedestrian crossings, wearing reflective clothing, buckling-up in motor vehicles and riding bicycles with lights, bells and helmets.

Launched here with the approval of the Road Safety Authority, the scheme has been introduced to coincide with the arrival of winter time when children are most vulnerable due to the shorter daylight hours.

Over the coming weeks, some 500,000 booklets will be distributed free of charge to through participating Texaco service stations, the first of which entitled 'Oscar and the Hairy Scary Tarantula's Tentacle' is now available. Luminous stickers that reflect the safety storyline within each booklet are also available free of charge for placement on children's coats and school bags.

To promote the campaign, Texaco commissioned research conducted by Millward Brown IMS, which showed that road safety is a subject best taught within the home. From interviews conducted amongst a national sample of over 500 parents with children aged ten years and under, some 97 per cent agreed it was the job of parents to teach their children about road safety in the first instance.

A website www.oscarsroom.ie has also been launched which offers parents and children the opportunity to interact with Oscar and find out how to be road safety aware.

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