Bombs not bicycles? MP uses defence spending debate to “make strange equivalence” blasting latest cycle investment plan; Oscar Onley resumes training after Dauphine crash, but Tour selection in doubt + more on the live blog
Bombs and bicycles...
In the cycling media, you can never rely upon just covering the ‘set-piece’ events – a Budget or a King’s Speech. Not least because slightly mad MPs could jump into any debate with a swipe at two-wheeled journeys at any time.
Just last week, abortive Labour leadership candidate Wes Streeting had some harsh words for the government’s latest Cycling and Walking Investment Strategy. All the more bizarre considering that, as a former Health Secretary, he should know the benefits of cycling more than most.
And, Streeting’s prioritisation of immediate defence spending is shared across the political aisle, based on the interventions this week of Conservative MP Andrew Murrison.
Taking part in Tuesday’s debate on Defence Spending and Readiness, South West Wiltshire MP, and Navy veteran Murrison compared the Polish government’s pledge of 4.8 percent of its GDP on Defence with the government’s £4.5 billion investment on “cycle tracks”. Those figures are misleading though, as the £4.5 billion will be spent over five years, and when equalised out over five years, amounts to 0.66 percent of GDP a year – based on OBR figures.
The Minister at the dispatch box, James Cartlidge, duly ducked the comparison but Murrison was undeterred, later returning to his theme, when he intervened during the speech of Liberal Democrat MP Al Pinkerton.
“The Liberal Democrats are famously known for their love of bicycling. Does he agree that it would be a good idea for the Government to drop their plan to spend £4.5 billion over five years on creating cycleways and rededicate that money to defence?”
But Pinkerton, himself a veteran, wasn’t buying it…
“The right hon. Gentleman makes a curious argument. The United Kingdom is a modern 21st-century European nation. I had a very pleasant cycle to and from Fulham this morning on a Lime bike using our cycleways. Frankly, I do not think it is a choice between one and the other—I am perfectly happy for the Government to spend money on both cycleways and defence. It is a very strange equivalence that the right hon. Gentleman seeks to make.”
A strange equivalence indeed…
Onley comeback!
Good news for Onley fans this morning, with the Scot uploading his first ride to Strava since falling down a ravine and into a tree at the Critérium du Dauphiné.
The bad news, is the caption, “Road to the Tour… of Guangxi.” Is this some delightful dry humour, or are we having to brace for a late season comeback? Maybe both, I’m not the comedy police.
The short hilly ride in Andorra seemed to be a coffee ride over the Coll d’Ordino and back. We’ll be on tenterhooks for when the interval efforts kick-in, and so will Netcompany-Ineos.
Between Onley’s crash and Kevin Vauquelin’s poor form (news has also broken of his withdrawal from the French national championships with illness), the British team might be without their two star GC signings at the biggest race of all.
How to survive cycling in the sun...
Seems like a good time to re-up this…
> Cycling survival — how to avoid sunburn and stay comfortable
Cool in one sense...
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Green wave in action
This is a nice explanatory video on the ‘green wave’ a policy proposal that Lime recently pitched in an editorial to be introduced in London. However, it didn’t quite receive the response hoped for…
If you are interested in cities or transportation and haven’t familiarized yourself with GREEN WAVES yet you really need to do yourself a favor. This is THE magic bullet.
— Miser (@misernyc.bsky.social) 24 June 2026 at 19:46
I will say though that I’m not sure the sped up video is beneficial to the cause, so many hazards, vehicles turning blind, it’s all rather nervy…
Visma join anti-doping trial that Pogačar's agent says will "only create problems"
I’m not sure turning down an anti-doping initiative is a great look, but hey what do we know?
Maybe cycling would be better off in its ‘wild west’ days…
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Ah, I thought when calling someone else's figure misleading and then having yours be found to be accidentally almost as bad, it might want to be corrected.
@Rendel Harris the uncomfortable truth about the tax gap is that it's not big business and billionaires that are the most at fault - it's small businesses who are either too disorganised to get things right, or see "tax dodging" as fair game so long as they're the ones who are doing it. And governments want their votes.
@BBB explain?
Thinking about it - could we sell this as a new self-defence strategy? "Remember WW2? We removed the signposts and turned off the streetlights *? If we install cycle paths and LTNs the invaders will never be able to get anywhere! Also a coastal cycle path will completely foil those attempting to enter this country on small boats. " * may not be a good idea through leading to more deaths on the roads / accidents at night than it saved by making it harder to bomb?
I don't buy Hansen's arguments. Presumably one of the things the analysts will do is estimate VO2 max for each rider using HR-, HRV-, power data and rider weight; and then monitor this over time both during each ride and across all rides. A sudden change in VO2 max would indicate something is amiss. In which case questions like “How do you know when he’s training at 80 per cent and not 100 per cent?" is irrelevant as long as the VO2 estimate is robust to different training intensities. However, if the analysts suspect there is an issue it will be up to them to prove it using the data and be able defend their methodology.
Or anyone arguing for more funding for the MoD, without someone else being in charge of the delivery.
That's not how this works. If Live Bloggers had to go around correcting all the errors in their posts, they'd never have time to post any new ones.
@wtjs Of course, there's also DU68 CHX, although that's only been without VED for 3 years so he's in line for a Good Citizenship Award in Lancashire. Then there's SO56 NKE (only 18 months), HN21 VXB ( a paltry 2 1/4 years), SR17 BFK (only 3 months), BU14 OFJ (only 2 years), HY66 ZZB (7 years) and that's just the ones recently seen around Garstang. WU59 UMH managed 8 years without VED, despite me reporting it regularly to the police because of the multiple years without MOT. It's been sold on to crims elsewhere and is now SORN/ No MOT. As you say- far easier to go after the evil cycling infra.
Either you are the OBR are wrong. 900 million a year is nowhere near 0.66% of GDP. However if looking at only government spending (which would make more sense) then the spend is 0.066% which means the figure is an entire order of magnitude out. Please update.
@mdavidford Oh what's £3.25 billion between friends?
16 thoughts on “Bombs not bicycles? MP uses defence spending debate to “make strange equivalence” blasting latest cycle investment plan; Oscar Onley resumes training after Dauphine crash, but Tour selection in doubt + more on the live blog”
A strange [false] dichotomy, surely?
A strange equivalence would be to suggest that we can fight off invasion (or possibly bomb random civilians in faraway countries) with cycle lanes.
Didn’t former Tory Chancellor Lord Lawson say that cycle lanes did more damage than the Luftwaffe to London? Surely we should spend £4.5 billion installing cycle lanes in hostile nations? More effective than bombing them.
“What’s that buzzing noise Vladimir? Is it the drones again? ”
“No, worse: Deliverossiyskoi riders on ebikes. We’ll never get through the congestion in the Donbass in time now…”
Thinking about it – could we sell this as a new self-defence strategy?
“Remember WW2? We removed the signposts and turned off the streetlights *? If we install cycle paths and LTNs the invaders will never be able to get anywhere! Also a coastal cycle path will completely foil those attempting to enter this country on small boats. ”
* may not be a good idea through leading to more deaths on the roads / accidents at night than it saved by making it harder to bomb?
Imagine anyone from the party that gave us HS2 lecturing on infrastructure investment.
Or anyone arguing for more funding for the MoD, without someone else being in charge of the delivery.
– Right then Carruthers, we need a really substantial rise in defence spending to put those pesky Ruskis in their place, at least £15 billion a year more. Suggestions?
– Well sir, the tax gap is currently £47 billion, how about we go after the evaders and avoiders, if we could just get a quarter of that back we could pay for everything we need.
– Oh Carruthers, I’m disappointed in you. Why on earth would you advocate such drop in the ocean pie in the sky schemes when there’s £900 million a year of cycle lane funding to be diverted?
One quarter of £47bn to fund at least £15bn? – you’ll never get a job at the treasury with maths like tha… actually, on second thoughts, never mind…
@mdavidford Oh what’s £3.25 billion between friends?
@Rendel Harris Well sir, the tax gap is currently £47 billion, how about we go after the evaders and avoiders, if we could just get a quarter of that back we could pay for everything we need
When Cat Smith MP wrote to DVLA about BF64 TGE over a year ago, pointing out that I first reported it along with the address in 2022, the company is at Companies House, the vehicle itself is proudly pictured on the company Facebook page etc., Lilian Greenwood wrote back stating Dodge 1 (we can’t comment on individual cases due to GDPR) and ‘we make VED easy to pay and difficult to avoid’. DVLA is absolutely determined to NOT KNOW about VED evaders, and make it really difficult to avoid them. They refuse to accept photographic evidence and the website makes it impossible to report anybody if you don’t know the address.
Sadly for us, We Do Nothing Greenwood declared herself in the House to be in charge of implementation of the January 2026 Government Road Safety Strategy, so that’s long been on that shelf with the big red Bin sign.
@wtjs Of course, there’s also DU68 CHX, although that’s only been without VED for 3 years so he’s in line for a Good Citizenship Award in Lancashire. Then there’s SO56 NKE (only 18 months), HN21 VXB ( a paltry 2 1/4 years), SR17 BFK (only 3 months), BU14 OFJ (only 2 years), HY66 ZZB (7 years) and that’s just the ones recently seen around Garstang. WU59 UMH managed 8 years without VED, despite me reporting it regularly to the police because of the multiple years without MOT. It’s been sold on to crims elsewhere and is now SORN/ No MOT.
As you say- far easier to go after the evil cycling infra.
@Rendel Harris the uncomfortable truth about the tax gap is that it’s not big business and billionaires that are the most at fault – it’s small businesses who are either too disorganised to get things right, or see “tax dodging” as fair game so long as they’re the ones who are doing it. And governments want their votes.
RE: green waves for lights. This is of course revolutionary for car-sick places like much of the UK and US.
When we’ve got our heads round this though we might spot this is still “thinking like a motorist” and “treating cyclists like they’re driving mini cars/motorbikes”.
At that point it’s time to learn about “separation at network level”, “unbundling / unravelling routes”. And cycle paths (where necessary) and junctions where traffic lights don’t always apply to cyclists. Or even smarter traffic lights with advanced detection of approaching cyclists and more (variable) phases, or things like default green for active travel / default red for motor traffic.
Perhaps we could skip ahead to some of that immediately?
Either you are the OBR are wrong. 900 million a year is nowhere near 0.66% of GDP. However if looking at only government spending (which would make more sense) then the spend is 0.066% which means the figure is an entire order of magnitude out. Please update.
That’s not how this works. If Live Bloggers had to go around correcting all the errors in their posts, they’d never have time to post any new ones.
Ah, I thought when calling someone else’s figure misleading and then having yours be found to be accidentally almost as bad, it might want to be corrected.