Cyclists have killed three in past six years

 

This is a correction to the previous blog in which I wrote “to the best of my knowledge” the last cyclist to kill someone was in 2016.

The story commented on how the danger from cyclists had been grossly exaggerated in the right wing press following statements from transport minister Grant Shapps.

That’s not to ignore the flagrant disregard for the safety of others posed by reckless riding, issues which the proposed changes in the law are intended to address.

Roger Geffen, Policy Director of Cycling UK, informs me there have been two other fatalities caused by people riding bikes since the one I referred to, which was in 2016.

The three deaths.-

In February 2016 Charlie Alliston knocked over and killed Kim Briggs as she crossed Old Street in London. His fixed wheel bike had no front brake. 

Briggs, a mother of two, suffered “catastrophic” head injuries and died in hospital a week later.

Alliston was cleared of manslaughter but found guilty of causing bodily harm by “wanton and furious driving”, a crime under the 1861 Offences Against the Person Act, which carries a maximum sentence of two years in jail.

He received an 18-month sentence.

In July 2020, in a hit and run, Ermir Loka, 23, struck Peter McCombie on Bow Road, Tower Hamlets, as he was walking home from work.

Mr McCombie, 72, died eight days later from injuries sustained in the crash.

Loka handed himself into police a little over three weeks later.

He was jailed for two years after being convicted at Snaresbrook Crown Court of causing bodily harm by wanton or furious driving.

In June 2021, in another hit and run, Stewart McGinn, 29, riding on the pavement and taking a corner at speed, ran head on into Mrs

Elizabeth Stone, 79. She suffered a fatal head injury.  

McGinn pleaded guilty to causing bodily harm by wanton or furious driving and was sentenced at Cardiff Crown Court. He was jailed for one year.

How Shapps whipped up road rage against cyclists

 

SHAPPS TO BLAME FOR LATEST CONFLICT WITH DRIVERS

 

Transport Secretary Grant Shapps could be nominated for this year’s Little Get Award (LGA), unless he’s pipped by another plonker.

“Get” is an impolite expression I first heard in Liverpool.

Someone nicking sweets from the corner shop would have the shop keeper running after them shouting, “Come ‘ere, yer Little Get!”

A Get is someone who buggers up things for others. 

Shapps buggered up cyclists’ reputations when he made two announcements which tarred cyclists as potential killers.

And he did this  via the shit stirring Daily Mail whose readership is highly impressionable, easily annoyed, and many of them swallowed the bait and came out all guns blazing looking for bike riders to shout and spit at.

  On August 6 he talked of plans to bring in a new offence of 'causing death by dangerous cycling', as part of the Transport Bill which he is due to unveil this Autumn.  He said the aim was to "impress on cyclists the real harm they can cause when speed is combined with lack of care”.

There can be no argument against the need for stronger laws to protect people from all dangerous road users, but the Mail piece created the image of potential dangerous cyclists everywhere. To the best of my knowledge the last case of a cyclist who killed  was in 2016 when a woman pedestrian died.  He was jailed 18 months.

To provide some perspective, it is motors which routinely kill, simply because of careless or dangerous driving, and too many drivers are on drugs or influenced by alcohol.

For example, the DfT records reveal that in 2019 there were 230 drink drive deaths.

In my own experience I more recently have encountered more considerate drivers who make space to allow me to pass down the inside of a queue,  for example, or holding back to allow me out of a junction. I always acknowledge them.

But then I live in a small country town, not in a city with roads jammed with traffic, where most angry exchanges occur.

The second Shapps story (August 16) was the subject of my previous blog and called for cyclists to have mandatory insurance, registration and for all cycles to carry number plates.

This idea has been floated before and dismissed by the Department for Transport because it would a bureaucratic nightmare to organise and anyway, unnecessary because so few cyclists cause accidents.

Again, cyclists come across as the bad guys.

Our image has been tainted of course by the dickheads who ride through red lights, on pavements and who upset horses. I can fully understand how that irritates everyone.

It does me.

Now Shapps purports to support his government’s own Active Travel Policy to increase numbers of cyclists by making the roads safer, albeit with not nearly enough funding.

So in making his statements to the right wing Daily Mail’s 5-million readership is this  Shapps rowing back on supporting cycling for fear of upsetting motoring voter? Probably.

What happened next was predictable.  The Mail articles stirred up their cloned readership who took to the roads in their motors shouting abuse to pedallers they encountered.

Guardian writer and cyclist Helen Pidd was one of those so insulted and she was moved to write about her experiences, telling how drivers began hurling insults at her, shaking rolled up copies of the Mail at her.

Spat at, abused and run off the road: why do some people hate cyclists so much? Ran the headline to her piece.

 

“Bike riders have always faced aggression from car drivers. But they now find themselves on the latest front in the culture wars – with anger whipped up by the right-wing press,” she wrote.

It was followed a few days later by almost a page of readers’ letters sharing their experiences, including drivers who admitted why they hated cyclists.

What’s up with these people?

Shapps surely engineered this deliberately.

Well, Mr Shapps, what can we say, except perhaps to thank you for being such a wonderful transport secretary, fantastic. Keep on being absolutely splendid.

And finally - HEADLINE OF THE WEEK:

From The New European - on the end of an era:

“FAREWELL BORIS JOHNSON,

AND THANKS FOR FUCK ALL.”

In the shop where I bought the paper they were so offended by those words they partially placed the bar code over them.