Toyota reckons it’s created the world’s first rear curtain airbag and it’ll install it on the company’s new iQ – its diminutive city car. Toyota reckons that this innovation will help prevent rear passenger injury in the case of a car hitting them from behind. Bearing in mind the micro dimensions of the iQ, there’s not that much crumple zone at the rear, so any extra protection is much appreciated.

Eventually the whole of the inside of the car will become a giant inflatable cushion to eliminate injury and death from all but the most severe of crashes, so I am surprised that a car manufacturer hasn’t come up with this before Toyota. I mean, it’s also an obvious step to put airbags in the rear of the front seats for the rear passengers, and in the roof in case a falling anvil drops on top of the car (Loony Tunes cartoons made me acutely aware of this danger.)

But every airbag we install in a car makes the car more disposable in the event of an accident. It’s incredibly expensive to reinstall airbags after a crash, and the liability is huge in the case that they don’t go off in a subsequent accident, so many cars are sent to the scrapheap purely for the economics behind replacing the airbags.

Of course, the ultimate in driver protection would be an airbag suit – an inflatable whole-body cushion that would be like smashing into a tonne of cotton wool and feathers.