http://www.cnn.com/2006/AUTOS/07/11/...all/index.html

Toyota's totally bizarre recall
Why would Toyota issue a recall designed to make vehicles less safe?

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The recall, announced Monday, is meant to make Tundras comply with a set
of safety regulations. The rules say that vehicles built after 2002 must
have a child-seat anchor system known as LATCH in the front seat if they
also have a front-seat airbag shut-off switch.

The Tundras in question were built with an airbag shut-off switch but not
the LATCH system.

The solution? Spend lots of money and inconvenience customers...to remove
the airbag shut-off switch.

The move not only doesn't enhance the safety of these vehicles, it
actually makes the vehicles unsafe for small children riding in the front
seat.

Those shut-off switches exist because airbags can injure and even kill
small children even in otherwise minor crashes.

Meanwhile, even without a LATCH system (which stands for lower anchorages
and tethers for children), parents can still install safety seats using
seatbelts.

Toyota originally discovered the compliance issue and, in a letter to the
National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) in July 2005, the
company asked regulators to let them to ignore it as "inconsequential to
safety."

NHTSA denied that petition. So Toyota asked NHTSA to reconsider, arguing
that the solution would be worse than the problem.

<...>

In its final decision. published on June 28, 2006, NHTSA pointed out that
the method a manufacturer might choose to remedy a compliance issue is
not a determining factor when deciding that it must be fixed, so Toyota's
warning made no difference.

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Yet another example of federal buracrat logic to protect people from
themselves.