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"I hated that": The final words of 6yo Myley, before she died in a quad bike accident.

As Myley Maxwell sat on the front of a quad bike, her 13-year-old friend tasked with steering momentarily lost control and skidded through a ditch.

It was clearly a scary moment. A video, which had previously shown Myley and four other girls laughing, singing and calling out to each other as they rode their adult-sized ATVs, captured what would be the six-year-old’s final words.

“I hated that,” she could be heard saying.

Myley was not wearing a helmet and the camera was still recording when the quad bike left the road and hit a tree. One girl on the back of the bike got up uninjured to see that the driver was knocked unconscious and Myley was “lying very still” and covered in blood.

She died of blunt force head trauma on the rural property in NSW’s north in March 2017.

myley maxwell
Myley Maxwell. Image: Twitter.
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Myley and the four 13-year-old girls should never have been on the bikes to begin with.

Warning labels on the vehicle stated no one under 16 should use it, helmets must be worn and no passengers should be carried. The mother of the 13-year-old driver, who's property they were on, told the inquest she had not read the labels.

"Tragically, Myley is not the first child to have died in this way," deputy state coroner Elizabeth Ryan said at an inquest into Myley's death on Thursday.

"She and her friends had been permitted by adults to use quad bikes in ways that were far outside their intended usage, and in complete disregard for warnings prominently displayed on the quad bikes."

The coroner recommended the introduction of new laws including the creation of a criminal offence for adults who allow children under 16 to ride adult-sized quad bikes.

Ryan also recommended amending legislation to allow police who have a reasonable suspicion of such offences being committed to enter private property to investigate, and mandatory licensing for adult riders.

myley maxwell family
Myley's family want new laws to be introduced that could've stopped their daughter's death. Image: Facebook.
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Myley's father Josh Maxwell told media outside the coroner's court he would like the recommendations to the implemented as "Myley's law, to make sure that no other child, no other family's got to deal with this again".

In 2015 an inquest into a number of other young people's deaths on quad bikes made recommendations that helmets should be worn on quad bikes, mandatory training should be required and children should be prohibited from adult-sized bikes.

These recommendations were also repeated after nine quad bike-related deaths in Queensland and again in 2017 after seven deaths in Tasmania.

In 2011 Emily Cason's 11-year-old son Sam died while using a quad bike during a sleepover at a friend's house in rural Victoria. He was not wearing a helmet and was not being supervised.

Cason – now an active campaigner for improved safety standards – told Mamamia in 2015 she “absolutely” agreed with the recommendations, but was sceptical about whether they would lead to action.

She said there was so much resistance, especially from farmers using the vehicles on private property, likening the changes to the introduction of seat belts in cars and roll bars on tractors.

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“Every time there’s something new that comes up, there’s always people who resist,” Ms Cason said.

“I think it might happen, but I think it will take a lot of work and education.”

Coroner Ryan told the inquest into Myley's death it was a "disappointing state of affairs" that these recommendations had not been implemented in NSW. She said she believed Myley would still be alive if the laws were enacted.

The coroner cited Safe Work Australia statistics that 18 of the 125 quad bike-related deaths in Australia between 2011 and 2018 were children aged under 16.

There were also two separate deaths of young children riding quad bikes in April this year, she said.

Myley had been visiting the 13-year-old friend for a birthday weekend with three other teenagers.

Ms Ryan said adults "continue to put children at risk" and the way the five girls were allowed to use two adult quad bikes on the day of Myley's death "was wholly inappropriate and unsafe".

"Myley's death was a tragedy that was entirely preventable. Her family is heartbroken by her death, and the four young girls who were with her are still struggling with their feelings of shock and sadness," Ms Ryan said.

"Like Myley's family, I hope that her death will prompt positive changes that will reduce the risk of other families being devastated in this way."

-With AAP.