The Police and Crime Commissioner for Sussex Katy Bourne has said cyclists should "wear some form of identification" so "you can prosecute them for breaking the law.”
According to Rachel Millard of Brighton and Hove paper The Argus, Bourne was repeatedly asked questions about cycling at a public meeting she hosted on Monday.
She told the meeting: “I would like to see cyclists wear some form of identification like cars have.
“So when they go through traffic lights, you can actually identify them and then you can prosecute them for breaking the law.”
As it's not the Police and Crime Commissioner's role to set policy, though, she said the idea was “one for the legislators.”
This was a “debate that should be had,” she said.
After the meeting, Bourne told The Argus: “It is something that has been at the back of my mind for a long time.
“Because when you use the road, if you are driving a car you have your number plate. Other people register, they pay to use the roads.
“Cyclists don’t, admittedly.
“But there have been occasions when I have been sat at red lights and seen cyclists go through.
“And it is never the responsible cyclists that do this – the ones that belong to the clubs, they are great, they are the ones that adhere to all the laws, so it is the few that ruin it for the many.”
Tony Green of the Brighton and Hove Cycling Campaign said that drivers don't pay to use the road. Road.cc readers will probably not need reminding that Vehicle Excise Duty is a charge related to emissions that goes into the Treasury's Big Money Pot and is not ring-fenced for roads.
Green said: “Cyclists are seen as the easy target. I don’t really know what it is, but maybe people think they are getting something for free.
“I agree there are cyclists who break the law but then ten or one hundred times as many motorists break the law.”
Carlton Reid, cycle campaigner and author of Roads were not built for cars, has a thorough debunking of the idea over on ipayroadtax.com.
46 thoughts on “Sussex PCC calls for bicycle registration”
“Because when you use the
“Because when you use the road, if you are driving a car you have your number plate. Other people register, they pay to use the roads.
“Cyclists don’t, admittedly.
Yes we do (I know talking to the converted) – I own a car so pay tax on that and pay income tax – when will these numpties get the message? ~X(
There was a short debate on
There was a short debate on Radio 5 about 11.30am today – it had her and Carlton Reid and obviously the usual phone calls/texts from frothing-at-the-mouth listeners.
As usual, it ended having created the right amount of web hits, text messages and controversy and won’t have changed anyone’s viewpoints on the matter.
PCC Idiot wrote:so it is the
Does she say the same about drunk drivers ruining it for every other driver? Or about rapists ruining it for every other man (or John Worboys ruining it for every other black cab driver)?
No? So fuck her and her retarded stupid collective responsibility bullshit nonsense.
If she spent more time thinking about it than a her usual reactionary brainfarts, she would realise that the scale of the bureaucracy alone would render the implementation impractical.
I can just imagine the cost
I can just imagine the cost of the infrastructure needed to read cycle ID tags or RF tagging and it’s mega bucks. What is the aim of these ideas? To improve safety? Generate Revenue? Keep pig headed drivers feeling like they are in the right?
I can’t see where this makes any practical sense. Can we get back to some proper police work now please Ms Bourne?
Because registering and
Because registering and licencing vehicles has stopped them breaking the law… oh wait…
Costly, impractical and it just creates another barrier to cycling in a country where car pollution is so bad that it kills more people than RTAs. Where air pollution is so bad that it regularly breaks EU law. Where inactive transport is one of the biggest reasons behind the fat crisis that is costing teh NHS billions and is arguably the leading cause of death.
Also Horses. How do you fix a
Also Horses. How do you fix a number plate to a horse?
I believe that people are allowed to walk on many roads too. Let’s just RFID chip everyone everwhere all the time.
Wow, because that would work
Wow, because that would work except for
the number plate would have to be big enough to read ruining the aero effect on modern road bikes…..will it come in carbon?
it would cost a fortune to run. Imagine the police having to stop people and check their credentials are not forged. It would however create a whole new tv series – police, camera, pedal.
Don’t even go near the tax issue.
I have been sat at red lights and regularly see drivers go through them, and i don’t see them being caught on a regular basis, same goes for using a phone whilst driving.
We would also need to stick a number plate on horses arses
-for equality-which by definition means Katy Bourne would need one as well. Glue would be cruel so maybe some sort of velcro that can use the horses hair for purchase.
Pedestrians should also have a number plate on their back as they cross the road and are therefore in scope.
So, so pointless.
Simmo72 wrote:
Pedestrians
I invoke Godwins law….
I am sure the Nazis had a habit of tattooing numbers on people….
More seriously, Number plates don’t stop drivers, illegal parking, speeding, RLJing, dangerous driving, etc etc. Yes they might help on the odd occasion and I suppose that number plates do have some uses. But to be of any use they have to be big enough to read easily. ie number plate sized any smaller and they are a waste of time and money.
Then we can move onto licences, drivers are trained and licenced and still break the law.
How about funding, well, I pay 20% vat on the bike, I pay income tax, VAT, Council Tax, RFL, all these taxes and the roads are still $**t, but none of these are dedicated to road repairs, I guess the only thing I can think of that might be is the Severn Bridge Toll? As an aside, France has peage, Switzerland has Vignettes, maybe that is why their motorways are well kept????
mrmo wrote:More seriously,
It’s worse than that.
Has anyone tried actually reporting a red-light running driver to the police, with numberplate? Do the police give a monkey’s if there’s no accident? Budgets are stretched and it’s not a priority.
Cyclists mostly aren’t capable of doing the kind of damage that warrants police time.
Also Horses. How do you fix a
Paslode nails or hot melt glue 👿
Hamster wrote:
Also Horses.
Surely you’d brand a reg number onto the right rump? Horses not cyclists… Oh but hang on… Branding. It the new tattooing!
As for running as for office. If it only takes 9% of the population to choose a halfwit from another halfwit maybe someone should run on a ‘pro motorist’ ticket and then reveal their pro cyclist leanings when they win? That’ll get some attention for the issue.
😀
And we let people with such a
And we let people with such a loose grip on understanding run a police force??? Oh no sorry we dont the current government do because putting untrained numpties in charge is what politics is all about! Pity they are now doing that with the highest paid public sector management roles too!
for me the acid test is will
for me the acid test is will it mean more kids can cycle (or walk) to school?
sometimes holding public office means telling the public some ugly truths about their attitudes and about having a vision for a better society
licensing cyclists would temporarily fix the earache for those that lack a backbone but contributes nothing to fixing the problem of a car dependent culture
antigee wrote:for me the acid
Won’t make a blind bit of difference.
Would it? Licensing drivers and cars doesn’t stop people getting injured or killed on the roads.
It would just be a very expensive appeasement exercise, that for a short period would shut motorists up.
Then would come the compulsory insurance argument, then the ‘taxation’ one, then the MOT one and so on.
Then you take away the beauty of cycling as a transport form, that it has very minimal costs after the outlay of a bike.
No doubt she’ll cook up a
No doubt she’ll cook up a scheme to save lots of money by stopping the electricity to all the cats eyes in the middle of the road soon! #o
A true candidate for tory party leadership if there ever was one – why let the truth get in the way of a good rant about the ‘undeserving’ in society! X(
“So when they go through
And I suppose enforcing existing laws, such as 20mph zones, should be left to her discretion…?
what a twit.
here’s her
what a twit.
here’s her twitter account in case anyone feels the need to educate her about ‘road tax’ – https://twitter.com/KatyBourne
If this is the most
If this is the most concerning thing for the Sussex PCC to take issue over, all those residents in Sussex must be living in the nicest safest place in the UK?
Sadly, this doesn’t really
Sadly, this doesn’t really surprise me; Sussex police are very anti-cyclist and turn a blind eye to motorists driving on the pavement (even outside their own police stations), using mobile phones whilst driving (seen their own officers doing this), red light jumping, forcing cyclists off the road, speeding and more.
Bloody PCCs – driving
Bloody PCCs – driving recklessly, no insurance http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-kent-29553185
Pay to use the roads … like
Pay to use the roads … like everyone then ?
I’d regitster if there was really a road tax … ass holes … :^o
Something that’s been at the
Something that’s been at the back of her mind ? Must be shuffling around for space between the things at the front of her mind ‘cos clearly there’s no significant spacial separation…
PCC
What are the current
PCC
What are the current levels of –
Murder
Rape
Burglary
Drugs crime
Robbery
Motor offences
Fraud
Racial motivated crime
Sexual assault
Physical abuse
Domestic abuse
Prostitution
Illegal immigrants
Tax evasion……….
I’m sure you should make sure all these are in check before you move onto something as petty as the OCCASIONAL cyclist jumping a light
The PCC’s are just another
The PCC’s are just another govt hurdle placed in the way of Police forces to run smoothly.
They were not wanted nor needed and cost a bloody fortune which could be better spent on other things.
At least Labour have said they will get rid of them if elected.
Police and Crime
Police and Crime Commissioners are a bad joke. I think only about 15% of the electorate voted in the election for this one.
(Also, surely there’s a conflict of interest in having the same person responsible for both the police _and_ for crime?)
edit – yup, just checked, she was elected with the votes of 5% of the total electorate. Clearly a mandate for her inspired policies.
“I would like to see cyclists
“I would like to see cyclists wear some form of identification…”
Is that wear just on the bike, or at all times you are out of the house on the off chance you might throw a leg over a crossbar?
I would love to find this idiot funny but I can’t. Every time I read the sentence above my mind keeps replacing ‘cyclists’ with ‘Jews’.
Strange how words have a power of their own, isn’t it?
Conservative politician makes
Conservative politician makes idiotic anti-cycling statement. :O
do registration plates on
do registration plates on cars stop drivers breaking the law?
no, thought not. :O
RichK wrote:do registration
not sure that’s really the point though, is it?
andyp wrote:RichK wrote:do
not sure that’s really the point though, is it?— RichK
Ok, do registratin plates on cars always result in drivers being prosecuted for driving misdemeanours?
On her twitter account she’s
On her twitter account she’s claiming it’s not her idea:
Pink triangle for me please.
Pink triangle for me please.
Idiot elected by minority who
Idiot elected by minority who could be bothered to turn out for an election to a post no one needs makes idiotic statement – well there’s a surprise. I assume she doesn’t ever bother to look at police road casualty statistics.
Errm, hire bikes?
Errm, hire bikes?
I do pay road tax. Several
I do pay road tax. Several thousand pounds of it every year.
We have PCCs so that people
We have PCCs so that people elect someone who has some ability to represent local concerns to the police.
We can all help to avoid idiots becoming PCCs by engaging with their elections. I know I didn’t last time around, which wasn’t the smartest.
Perhaps pedestrians could be
Perhaps pedestrians could be made to wear some form of registration number so that should they commit an offence of some sort (assault, burglary, shoplifting, rape, murder…) they can be easily identified and punished accordingly.
I don’t understand why
I don’t understand why cyclists seem to irritate and anger people so much, especially when it comes to ‘crime’ such as RLJing etc, is it that people have given up complaining about more serious crime, or is that cyclists are more visible even when not doing anything wrong, and could be seen as a potential crime waiting to happen in the same way that groups of teenagers hanging around in a park cause an elevated amount of worry in comparison to the minor amount of crime they actually commit?
I think when it can be proven that vehicle registration etc has had the effect of reducing motoring offences and road fatalities down to a comparable proportion to that of cyclists (numbers of offences/accidents per road user) then I will gladly carry a number plate or attach one to my jacket or jersey. Until that point then I think there are a lot bigger things for them to concern themselves with.
RobD wrote:I don’t understand
Its because we as cyclists are responsible for and guilty of everything from Original Sin to 9/11. Didn’t you get the memo? 😉
Interesting coverage of the
Interesting coverage of the matter by the Guardian, including a revealing interview with Bourne:
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/bike-blog/2014/oct/09/police-commissioner-proposes-id-for-cyclists-but-cant-explain-why-or-how
Everyone seems to be ignoring
Everyone seems to be ignoring the big issue here, which is of course the use of the word ‘sat’ instead of ‘sitting’. How on earth is this person allowed to hold any post within the community?
Problem is, this is what
Problem is, this is what she’ll hear in community meetings. My wife runs our local police liason group and pavement cycling regularly crops up as the number 1 or 2 complaint (I should consider myself lucky to live in an area where that’s what people think about when they think about crime). So it’s an unsurprising political reflex to come out with what you think your audience wants to hear.
Even so, the failure to engage the brain even minimally before speaking is particularly striking in this case.
Excellent news. Now I can
Excellent news. Now I can look forward to pushchairs and umbrella carriers having registration plates and third party insurance.
And I’ll be more than happy for jay walking to be introduced into the legislation too.
Happy days.
Some cars don’t attract
Some cars don’t attract Vehicle Excise Duty, what about them?
The last time something like
The last time something like this happened was when the Nazis occupied France!
Not really sure that an
Not really sure that an opinion made by someone who was elected as second preference on the back of only a 15.8% turnout (including spoiled papers) is even worth commenting on or reporting in the first instance.
Don’t attach her comments to the Police. She is not a police officer and never will be. It is hard to see who these PCCs are answerable to but we certainly know who pays their wages; income tax paying cyclists for one.