With the Infrastructure Bill almost certain to become law and including provision for cycling, how will the three main parties provide for cycling after the next election?
To find out, the UK Cycling Alliance – an umbrella group for campaigning organisations – is organising a debate with transport spokesmen from the Conservative, Liberal-Democrat and Labour parties in London on Monday, March 2 at 11:30, venue to be announced.
The Big Cycling Debate is billed as the first chance to hear the major parties' manifesto commitments and ambitions on cycling.
The debate will be chaired by John Humphrys of Radio 4's Today program and will feature Conservative Robert Goodwill MP, the Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Transport and 'Minister for Cycling' in the current Government; Liberal-Democrat Julian Huppert MP, co-chair of the All-Party Commons Committee on Cycling and vice chair of the party's Federal Policy Committee; and Richard Burden MP, Labour's shadow minister for transport.
The debate will be hosted by News UK, publisher of The Times newspaper which began its Cities Fit for Cycling campaign for better conditions for cyclists after journalist Mary Bowers was severely injured when she was hit by a lorry near the paper's offices in November 2011.
15 thoughts on “Major political parties to present bike policies at Big Cycling Debate”
It’s a shame UKIP weren’t
It’s a shame UKIP weren’t invited as their policies would make for light relief.
darrenleroy wrote:It’s a
Do we know they weren’t invited? I wouldn’t be surprised if they’d chosen not to take part.
We have to get the cycling
We have to get the cycling bingo card out for this. I wonder how long it will take for the Tory to ask if it about time cyclists start paying “road tax”
I would have liked someone
I would have liked someone with a deep knowledge of the issues around everyday cycling, such as Chris Boardman, to chair this and to really interrogate the parties.
I appreciate The Times & Kaya Burgess for pulling this together, but do think they may get an easy ride if the chair does not understand or appreciate the real and key issues
gazza_d wrote:I would have
Well The Times has been quite a champion for cycling and infrastructure spending over the past few years. There is also quite an issue with using someone who is a campaigner as a chair in an election debate. During an election debate, the parties should rightly expect the chair to be reasonably impartial, though they may well pose questions submitted by the likes of CB.
would it not be that either
would it not be that either Carswell nor Reckless as MP’s would particularly be pro bike (unlike those MP’s attending) and also I doubt many are in UKIP (difficult to cycle when so backwards).
“Major” political parties –
“Major” political parties – surely you mean some political parties – including the Lib Dems immediately means that it includes smaller parties – and as such, it’s just picking and choosing for the sake of the organisers world view.
I vote for Bez to chair the
I vote for Bez to chair the debate. 😉
Why no Green Party? They are
Why no Green Party? They are polling as high as the Lib Dems. They have an MP, MEPs and 2 London Assembly members (one of whom came 3rd in the Mayoral elections in 2012). Is this very old fashioned thinking by the debate organisers?
Is John Humphrys not quite
Is John Humphrys not quite anti-cyclist?
SRD wrote:Is John Humphrys
Yes.
I’ve been listening to the Today programme for as long as I can remember and have great respect for Mr Humphrys but he has form on this one issue.
Shame they’re not invited as
Shame they’re not invited as it would be nice if The Green Party could expand slightly on their manifesto statement: ‘We will make walking and cycling safer – better for our health and the environment.’.
The Lib-Dems are still a
The Lib-Dems are still a major party when you look at the amount of votes they have got over the years. Thats why they pushed for proportional representation as they would have had numerous MP’s.
I like the idea of a well known person to chair the debate, perhaps not CB as he is not totally independant, someone like Dimbleby who cycles a lot and can keep the MP’s in line as Question Time proves.
Can we trust any of our
Can we trust any of our political parties, and the media which gives succour to them, to take cycling and walking seriously? Are the Greens any dfferent? Without PR are we often forced to vote tactically for one of the major parties simply to keep the other out, knowing full well both have extremely poor records in promoting cycling and walking?
In spite of that I hope the debate will signal progress. However, a better format would be to include an equal number of cycling advocates, especially Chris Boardman, to ask searching questions. Otherwise, we will get the usual bland statements without any real commitment.
I fully expect the number and
I fully expect the number and severity of bare-faced lies being told by candidates from all “major” parties to reach such a vast quantity that it causes interference to short-wave radio.
It might even be almost funny (if it weren’t so tragic) to listen to them trying to out-lie each other.