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news
Wimborne (CC BY SA 2.0 by Ron Strutt on Wikimedia Commons)Man threatens to punch cyclist, 14, who was riding on pavement due to puncture making it too dangerous to stay on road
The mother of a 14-year-old cyclist has spoken out after a man threatened to punch her son for cycling on the pavement.
Isaac Slade, aged 14 and a student at Queen Elizabeth School in Wimborne Minster, Dorset, would usually have ridden on the road during his commute to and from school.
However, on his six-mile journey home, he noticed that one of his tyres had developed a slow puncture, so rode on the pavement instead.
The Dorset Echo reports that his mother Nikki Slade, who is the leader of Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole Council, wrote about the incident on her Facebook page.
She said that Isaac alerted two pedestrians ahead of him that he was about to ride past them, but one turned round and said he would punch the youngster in the face if he did not get on the road.
“He was threatened with being punched off his bike,” said Councillor Slade, who represents the Liberal Democrats on the council, which is controlled by the Unity Alliance coalition.
“He had a puncture and it was safer for him to go slowly on the pavement,” she continued.
“He was coming down by the sorting office and he was on the pavement with two people in front of him.
“He called out to them ‘Excuse me’ so he could get past them and the guy turned around and says, ‘If you don’t get in the road, I’ll punch you off your bike’.”
She said that all of her children ride to and from school every day and that “Isaac would normally have been riding his bike in the road. It was just this one particular occasion that he wasn’t.
“He’s a gentle person and he’s absolutely mortified by this,” added Councillor Slade, who is hoping to obtain CCTV footage of the incident.
“We’re doing our best to encourage kids to be independent and get themselves around, and this was a horrible thing to have happened.
“We ask our children to take responsibility and be respectful, and then grown adults don’t show any respect for them in return.”
In 2014, then transport minister Robert Goodwill reiterated that the Department for Transport’s official line was that cyclists are allowed to ride on the pavement so long as they do so considerately.
> Transport minister: Responsible cyclists CAN ride on the pavement
The guidance is based on that originally published by former Home Office minister Paul Boateng in 1999 when fixed notice penalties were originally introduced, and repeated five years later.
The original 1999 guidance said: “The introduction of the fixed penalty is not aimed at responsible cyclists who sometimes feel obliged to use the pavement out of fear of traffic and who show consideration to other pavement users when doing so.
“Chief police officers, who are responsible for enforcement, acknowledge that many cyclists, particularly children and young people, are afraid to cycle on the road, sensitivity and careful use of police discretion is required.”
Simon joined road.cc as news editor in 2009 and is now the site’s community editor, acting as a link between the team producing the content and our readers. A law and languages graduate, published translator and former retail analyst, he has reported on issues as diverse as cycling-related court cases, anti-doping investigations, the latest developments in the bike industry and the sport’s biggest races. Now back in London full-time after 15 years living in Oxford and Cambridge, he loves cycling along the Thames but misses having his former riding buddy, Elodie the miniature schnauzer, in the basket in front of him.
Latest Comments
- essexian 0 sec ago
If you see the Green's manifesto published today, it reflects the platform on which Mr Starmers party should be standing....
- OldRidgeback 8 min 1 sec ago
Yep, a lot of the route is wide enough to have trams running alongside the bike/pedestrian path.
- hawkinspeter 25 min 48 sec ago
They rely on the honour system
- hawkinspeter 27 min 24 sec ago
They look cool and they're more aerodynamic
- john_smith 38 min 23 sec ago
I have been using the same toothbrush since 1973. Our loo brushes were originally purchased by my great great grandmother. All original parts too.
- EngFan 55 min 33 sec ago
I have had a very close pass experience a couple of weeks ago where the driver admitted and took joy from passing close. I have studdied the...
- stonojnr 1 hour 19 min ago
Well quite, and that's the daft thing a debate about trade teams supporting womens cycling, and we're left counting how many world championships...
- brooksby 1 hour 32 min ago
I wonder how much profit the organisers make? Behaviour like that would lead me to believe that they don't exactly have a float to pay for their...
- nniff 1 hour 42 min ago
The law is an ass, but a hoof would make short work of a wing mirror
- Velophaart_95 1 hour 42 min ago
What a load of nonsense they spout. The majority of cyclists who aren't racing, couldn't give a flying **** about bleeding energy or dead spots......
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60 comments
A lot of leavers were Labour supporters, usually from lower income areas. Bit classist all this? Those thick poor people, dont know what's best for them. Far better for the well educated to make their decisions eh Burt? It's ok though as they were all filthy racists etc.
I bet the reason 'hate' crimes are up is because the police are doing stuff like investigating the refusal of guy to have sex with a transgender woman who still had a penis. Recording hate crimes is fish in the barrel stuff for the police. Far easier to record and deal with than actually tackling street crime.
I wish we could run an alternative time line without Brexit and I bet all these crimes wouldn't be substantially different. Your cause and effect analysis is very flawed. May as well correlate drinking gin with hate crimes or vaping or eating yoghurt. Your entire post is literally conjecture.
Disregarding the argument, the story was actually a photographer refusing to submit photos he had taken of a transgender woman because he previously did not know she was trans, and she reporting it and his comments to the police.
There was no sex. I'm not even sure there's a penis. The photographers actions may or may not be transphobic, so may Ricky Gerais, it's very difficult to tell from the type of publications this has been reported in. However with Brexit in mind this is a great example of a story mutating beyond recognition from its original source
burt - I hate the Leave propoganda but "but the leavers are xenphobic, racist, ignorant, violent gammons, while the remainers tend to be well educated, articulate, intelligent and peaceful" is about as watertight as the leavers arguments.
I know some leavers who are well educated, articulate, intelligent and peaceful just as I know some remainers who are toal arseholes.
I agree with your point about the amount of hate that has been stirred up and a feeling that nobody is accountable for or should be challenged for their actions 'cos you is a lefty snowflake anti-democracy ****'.
You're right of course, and it's the 99% that give all the rest of the leavers a bad name.
Comments in local anti cycling rag
https://www.bournemouthecho.co.uk/news/17990004.ill-punch-off-bike-mans-...
Same person driving his car.
"Beep Beep, out the way this is my road and you don't pay car tax, get on the pavement"
What would help here is if all pedestrians had reg plates, high viz and wore a helmet
I don't understand why the police aren't looking for this bully. Threatening to assault a minor is in no way acceptable.
What we have here is nothing short of a bully. You know that if it were a full grown adult man, there's no way he'd have said any such thing.
Children can't really fight back. Strong, fit adults certainly can.
I wonder if he was equally irate with all the drivers leaving their cars all over the footpath, driving faster than the speed limit, on their phones, spewing out fumes clogging his lungs. Busy guy.
I cycle down that road regularly and even walked down it daily for 3 years and never noticed how pretty it is. Road surface is shite. This is more surprising as usually the drivers at least are more tolerant in wimborne than those of Bournemouth and the new forest
Cycling lad - "Excuse me"
Person - "Ideally you should be cycling on the road rather than the pavement"
Cycling lad - "I know, I usually do, but I have a slow puncture"
Person - "Oh, do you have a puncture repair kit or spare tube? If so I can help you fix it"
Or some similar conversation, without being a prick.
Mum: how did you get a black eye?
Son: I had a puncher on the way home.
How people got so intolerant to constantly be on the edge of violence?
Brexit. And that isn't a joke.
The entire Brexit process started with xenophobia and the media stoking up hatred of others, and the politicians deliberately stirring things to get the gullible racists to vote for them. With so much hatred and vitriol in society, it is hardly surprising that cyclists, as an out group that can be safely hated, get made the target for these sad deluded people. All measured forms of hate crime have increased since the referendum and the blatantly partisan and illegal leave campaign, so some people take their hatred out on whoever is nearest.
Is there no end to the malignancies caused by Brexit? And all caused by those on one side of the argument, how strange.
Perhaps you haven't been paying attention, but the leavers are xenphobic, racist, ignorant, violent gammons, while the remainers tend to be well educated, articulate, intelligent and peaceful; witness the two recent marches in London. The first, with just a few hundred leavers, had violence, foul language, multiple arrests and public disorder. The second, with at least a million, but some estimates said double that, of remainers, completely peaceful, civilised and orderly. Spot the difference?
You're absolutely right. I'm a thick as pigshit, racist, violent gammon who shouldn't be allowed out on his own.
I'm still not sure how me voting to leave caused somebody else to threaten a 14 year old three years later. It's a puzzle, right enough.
If you admit it then you're not a Brexiteer.
Rule one of Brexit club: Deny it and claim sovereignty and taking back control.
Membership revoked.
The "No true Scotsman" fallacy. How nice to see it in the wild.
I cheered for Jair Bolsonaro to become president of Brazil, but now that I saw his true colors I'm so ashemed. We just cannot trust any source of news anymore. It requires so much effort to be impartial.
Nothing says well educated, articulate, intelligent and peaceful like dehumanising those you disagree with politically.
Have a look at some of the less savoury political movements of the 20th Century.
Look at the language those movements used towards their ideological opponents.
Take a moment and reflect on your own behaviour.
Take a moment to reflect on your own poor-taste hyperbole and desperate seeking of victim-status.
I'm weary of the powerful trying to play the victim. It's the prime trope of our era. It was, as it happens, also a driving force for those 'less savoury political movements'. You should be ashamed.
You aren't a put-upon-minority facing potential genocide. (And nor are 'Brexiters' as a group). You are clearly a comfortably-off middle-class white guy. Stop it.
(Oh, and if you are so concerned with language, maybe have a word with your fellow Brexit-supporters about their constant and tedious use of "remoaner"...not because it will lead to a holocaust, but because it's just boring and naff)
(I don't, as it happens, agree with the OP - the divide between 'leave' and 'remain' teams is complicated - there appear to be multiple factors, age being one...can't seem to find the article with scatterplots that illustrated some of them)
Shame you just were 1 short for four corners on the bigot bingo. You had classism (middle class), racism (white) and sexism (guy). close but no cigar.
Didn't see this post previously.
Invoking someone's race, class and/or gender to undermine their argument?
Nice. Real nice.
If you don't think dehumanising language is a bad thing pick up a history book and educate yourself.
There's this one featuring scatterplots: https://www.newstatesman.com/politics/staggers/2016/06/how-did-different-demographic-groups-vote-eu-referendum
A more recent and detailed analysis is available here: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0176268018301320
That's a sweeping generalisation and isn't very fair (or true).
The problem is that people who are xenophobic and racist often turn out to be Leavers, but that doesn't work the other way round. There are some good arguments for leaving vs remaining, but they don't tend to get much publicity due to all the misinformation on both sides.
When the Brexit issue first came up, I was originally a Leaver (though I didn't have strong views on it) and it was only after discussing it with various people and reading a bit that I changed my mind and ended up voting remain. I certainly don't consider myself racist etc.
That's very unfair and likely to polarise opinions further. I agree with Rick_Rude and Rich_cb. I'm sure many people voted 'Leave' for what they felt (and may still feel) are genuine, important reasons, even if you and I disagree with them.
It's not their fault that the whole thing has not been presented clearly or fairly in the media. Sports commentator Clive Tyldesley has posted a fascinating 8-minute instagram video on why the MSM has failed the British public. Peter Oborne, a pro-Brexit right wing journalist, has written a long, detailed article for Open Democracy on the way many journalists have lost their integrity and have become part of the propaganda machine in exchange for access. "It’s chilling. From the Mail, The Times to the BBC and ITN, everyone is peddling Downing Street’s lies and smears. They’re turning their readers into dupes."
I'd argue that we shouldn't expect a lot from newspapers, they've generally been nasty propaganda rags owned by millionaires who want to exert influence over public opinion and government policy. But the way the BBC has reported it (and similarly the topic of climate change) is truly shameful; it has given far too much airtime and credit to people who really don't deserve either.
Returning to the topic, it seems that this man is simply a pathetic bully. Sadly, there are far too many of them around.
My 13 yr old daughter was told off (admittedly not threatened with a punch) by a woman for walking on her 'private grass verge'. She would actually rather my daughter have walked onto a 40mph dual carriageway round a parked car in a layby.
What is the matter with people??
Back near the beeginning of the year, a woman had parked and completely filled up a shared-use path on my way home.
She was coming out of the adjacent house (with three cars parked on the very spacious driveway) and I gestured at her car and said something not rude but pretty derogatory.
She said I could walk around on the road.
I pointed out that it was less than safe to be walking into oncoming traffic with a bicycle, on a road with a 50mph speed limit.
Her response was to swear at me quite extensively, then tell me stop having a go at her, get in her car, drive at me so I had to get out of her way, and go off on her merry way...
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