Limited review of the child restraint systems for use in motor vehicles mandatory standard

Overview

The ACCC invites you to have your say on the proposed updates to the mandatory standard for child restraints – Consumer Protection Notice No. 3 of 2014 - Safety Standard: Child Restraint Systems for use in Motor Vehicles. The mandatory standard first came into effect in 1978 and was last updated in 2014.

The mandatory standard covers requirements for design, construction, performance, testing and informative labelling. It applies to child restraints (often referred to as car seats) and booster seats as well as their components. It does not apply to motor vehicle child restraints designed for children with a disability or to items that are an integrated feature of a motor vehicle, such as an anchor point.

About this review

We are conducting a limited review of the mandatory standard for child restraints. The purpose of this limited review is to:

• update the mandatory standard to reference the latest version of the voluntary Australian Standard, while maintaining the existing variations and exclusions.
• determine if adding dynamic references is appropriate – so updates to the referenced voluntary standard flow through to the mandatory standard.

We have not identified any overseas or international standards that offer a comparable level of safety and are suitable to reference as compliance options in the mandatory standard.

Significant changes such as altering the scope of the mandatory standard or other major requirements (such as performance measures) are not being considered in this review. These may be considered in a future comprehensive review.

We welcome your feedback on the options listed in this consultation.

You can read more about the reforms to the mandatory standard framework and limited reviews on the ACCC Product Safety website.

How to make a submission

Interested parties are invited to comment on this consultation.

Submissions are due by Friday 28 November 2025.

This consultation survey should take about 30 minutes to complete. You can save your answers and return at any time to complete your submission. You do not need to complete all questions to make a valid submission.

You will be able to provide supporting documentation (if required) at the end of the consultation.

We prefer interested parties respond to the questions using the online survey linked at the bottom of this page.

If you are unable to make your submission through the ACCC Consultation Hub, you can post or email your submission to:

Director
Standards Reform Team
Consumer Product Safety Division
Australian Competition & Consumer Commission
GPO Box 3131 Canberra ACT 2601

Email: ProductSafety.Regulation@accc.gov.au

If you are emailing or posting your submission, please include your name, organisation (if any) and contact details when making a submission.

Our preference is for submissions to be in electronic format (such as MS Word or PDF) that is text searchable and allows a ‘copy and paste’ function.

Publication of submissions

All submissions will be treated as public documents and published on the ACCC Consultation Hub in accordance with the ACCC’s Information Policy, unless otherwise requested.

Any parties wishing to submit commercial-in-confidence material should clearly mark it as such and submit both a public version and commercial-in-confidence version of their submission, with reasons explaining why it is confidential. More information about the ACCC’s treatment of confidential information can be found in the ACCC’s Information Policy.

Next steps after consultation

We will review submissions and determine our recommendation to the Minister about updating the mandatory standard.

We may consult with stakeholders again before the mandatory standard is finalised and will publish the outcome of this limited review on the ACCC Product Safety website.

Accessibility

If you have any difficulty accessing any of the information on this page, please refer to our website’s accessibility information. Alternatively, contact us by email at ProductSafety.Regulation@accc.gov.au or phone 1300 302 502 Monday to Friday between 11 am and 3 pm AEDT.