A Conservative MP has urged the government to bring in a law relating to causing death by dangerous cycling, something ministers have been promising for several years now but which has not yet entered the statute books.
In a question put to Mark Spencer, the Tory MP for Sherwood and Leader of the House of Commons, Devizes MP Danny Kruger cited the case of Diana Walker, who was killed on Pewsey High Street in May 2016 in a crash involving a cyclist. No charges have ever been brought against the rider.
“The following year the Government announced a consultation on a new offence of causing death by dangerous cycling,” Mr Kruger noted. “The year after that, in 2018, my predecessor Claire Perry was assured by the Government that the response to the consultation would be issued shortly.
“Four years on, we still have no response. Since 2019, I have written to the Government four times to ask for a date for when it will happen,” he added, urging Mr Spencer to speak to the Department for Transport (DfT) to draw up a timetable for the drafting and implementation of the legislation.
In response, Mr Spencer said that Secretary of State for Transport Grant Shapps “is planning to publish our response to the consultation as soon as we can and has already announced that we are considering bringing forward legislation to introduce new offences around dangerous cycling.
“We will do that as part of a suite of measures to improve the safety of all road and pavement users.”
Currently, cyclists involved in a crash in which a pedestrian is killed can face charges of manslaughter and of causing bodily harm through wanton and furious driving – the latter falling under the Offences Against the Person Act 1861.
Calls for a specific offence of causing death by dangerous cycling intensified in 2017 after cyclist Charlie Alliston was convicted of causing bodily harm through wanton and furious driving following a crash in London’s Old Street in which pedestrian Kim Briggs lost her life. Alliston was acquitted by an Old Bailey jury of manslaughter, however.
In the wake of the case the victim’s widower, Matthew Briggs, has been campaigning for a specific law to be drawn up relating to causing death or serious injury while cycling, saying that bike riders should be subjected to similar laws to motorists.
In January this year, Shapps confirmed that legislation would be brought in to create a new offence of causing death by dangerous cycling.
> Grant Shapps calls for new ‘death by dangerous cycling’ law
Speaking to LBC’s Nick Ferrari about the changes to the Highway Code that were due to take effect towards the end of that month, he said: “The purpose of the changes is if you drive a lorry, you should give way to a van, which will give way to a car, which will give way to a cyclist, which will give way to a pedestrian. These are just common-sense changes to protect everybody.
“And there is another change I’m bringing in which you may not be aware of, which is to make sure that we’re able to prosecute cyclists who, for example, cause death by their own dangerous cycling.
“So this is quite a balanced package, and I think it’s worth noting that the injuries and deaths that take place because of cyclists are also unacceptable,” Shapps added.
At the time, Duncan Dollimore, head of campaigns at the charity Cycling UK, told road.cc: “Changes to the Highway Code are beneficial to all road users, and it is unhelpful of the Transport Secretary to try and explain or justify them on a quid pro quo basis by linking them to the potential introduction of new cycling offences. The two issues are entirely separate.
“As the Transport Secretary’s own minister Andrew Stephenson confirmed in December, the DfT is already working on the terms and remit of a call for evidence into road traffic offences. While that is long overdue, with a full review first promised over seven years ago after prolonged campaigning from Cycling UK, there’s little more than we can say on this issue, other than that we’ve never opposed cycling offences being be part of that review.
“Introducing new cycling offences in isolation however would simply be a sticking plaster on a broken system, because our current careless and dangerous driving offences aren’t fit for purpose – replicating them for cycling makes no sense at all,” he added.
During 2020, 346 pedestrians lost their lives in road traffic collisions in Great Britain, but cyclists were involved in only four of those fatal crashes, and it should also be noted that those figures, which come from the DfT, do not seek to apportion blame.
Due to their comparative rarity, however, crashes that result in a cyclist being prosecuted following the death of a pedestrian do tend to attract a disproportionate amount of coverage in the national press – typically accompanied by calls for the law to be updated.
61 thoughts on “Tory MP urges government to bring in ‘death by dangerous cycling’ law”
Fantastic, we can all start
Fantastic, we can all start getting our excuses ready.
“Sorry mate didn’t see you”
“I thought I hit a bollard”
“You shouldn’t have been in the road, you don’t pay road tax”
“You were in the blindspot of my glasses”
“Grow up and get a car to cross the road”
“Why were you in the road, theres a pavement right next to the road”
I could go on
Think that only works if –
Think that only works if – like motoring – the police, lawyers, expert witnesses, jury, judge, aldermen, media staff and MPs either cycle every day to get on with their lives or rely on someone else to cycle-rickshaw them. And know that all their friends / family / role models do too.
But then – if that was the case then I think this whole point would be moot (e.g. we’d have normal cycling on normal cycles by normal people).
Perhaps they ought to
Perhaps they ought to consider actually carrying out that comprehensive road safety review, and then decide about ‘death by bicycle’ once they’ve checked the statistics…
brooksby wrote:
I think they’re quite busy running around and trying to distract everyone from how badly the Tories are now doing.
True. I presume Johnson is
True. I presume Johnson is currently trying to establish a reliable supply of dead cats…
hawkinspeter wrote:
Fixed that for you 🙂
Clearly this MO has a vacuum
Clearly this MP has a vacuum for a brain. How many people do vehicle drivers kill a year? How many people do cyclists kill a year (in his example obviously criminal blame wasn’t attached to the cyclist)? He – and the government – should do his homework before spouting nonsense. Oh, he’s an MP, silly me…
Surreyrider wrote:
— SurreyriderHe is a tory, so by definition………
Would be nice to know the
Would be nice to know the full details of this case to comment further. But to use an incident where the Police decided no charges, including the ones that could have been used to be the reason to bring in a new law does seem strange.
Not sure if this helps but
Not sure if this helps but does provide some background details
https://expressdigest.com/police-fail-to-probe-cyclist-who-hit-gran-in-fatal-crash
Awavey wrote:
That article is filled with speculation and a lot of bias…. quoting his average speed of 23mph, “At one stage he added that he had hit 30mph when travelling ‘downhill within the national speed limit’.”
Could you imagine an article in a newspaper involving a pedestrian killed by a motorist in a 30 zone stating “their dashcam showed the average speed of their journey was 50mph, and at one point they reached speeds of up to 70mph on a motorway on that journey”. What relevance is an average speed of a journey or the maximum speed that someone got to on that same journey if they were doing less than that at the point of impact.
That would be covered by the
That would be covered by the “not sure if this helps…” part
Yes I had read that and also
Yes I had read that and also seen the BBC article from last year as well. However the report of the accident had the local councillors etc only complaining about the initial emergency service reponses to get there, nothing about cyclists being too fast which for a local village council, is normally a go to. It is only after that the husband “gathered evidence”* that started this thing about being too fast. But even then, the main clout seemed to be the Police not investigating properly and not there wasn’t an appropriate law. Which is why I don’t get why this one is being used to push it.
* The second fastest on local sectors. I wonder if they mean second overall out of everyone which would be good going being as the TdB did that exact segment in 2014. I suspect it meant his second fastest personal time.
It sounds like a case of a
It sounds like a case of a pedestrian stepping into the road without looking. But there is evidence that some cyclists come down that section at the 30mph limit. There’s a strava segment that I’m amazed isn’t flagged after this.
This is not the ‘way over 30mph’ that her husband claims to have witnessed, but too quick for a road like this if pedestrians are about.
I think he would be better off campaigning for a 20mph limit, removal of the car parking spaces on the bend, traffic calming measures and a zebra crossing. Three years prior, a woman cyclist was injured at exactly the same spot.
HoarseMann wrote:
Muggles are always completely hopeless at estimating cyclist speed, part 156,843.
Or just pedestrianise the whole street.
HoarseMann wrote:
I tend to agree with you that it was a case of the pedestrian stepping into the road without looking.
And as for this ‘Eyewitness Janet Bailey told the inquest Mr Albery’s bike had come ‘out of nowhere’ again it is dubious at best. Just looking at the various reports on the accident, and the alleged speed of the cyclist I reckon the cyclist should have been visible for at least 4 or 5 seconds.
But as is the case cyclists always “appear out of nowhere” when you are only listening for traffic instead of looking for it.
AlsoSomniloquism wrote:
Colours to the mast: we don’t need a new offence, for all the reasons given, especially the de minimis aspect.
But the principle here is right: something happened that the MP thinks should not, and after investigation, the police, CPS etc, say that no crime was committed. It’s not illogical for the MP to argue that a new crime is needed, even though I know he’s wrong about it.
I would argue that the same applies to driving offences as currently set up and (mostly not) enforced. Bad things (in my view) happen that are not prosecuted, and we have insufficient deterrence as a result. The effect of the laws needs to change: for instance the definitions of “careless” or “dangerous”, the efforts made to enforce, etc.
This kind of parliamentary intervention is sometimes how such things begin, even though in this area we need far wider ranging and more coordinated action such as the mythical review.
Tory MPs Are Thick As Pigshit
Tory MPs Are Thick As Pigshit, part 4,065.
No charges have ever been brought against the rider who hit Diana Walker.
Had Wilts police been able to make a criminal case, they would surely have had the CPS bring a charge against the rider. But they didn’t and in fact said “Our enquiries found that no crime had been committed.”
As far as I can tell from local paper reports, Diana Walker stepped out in front of the rider, who said at the inquest into her death that he was doing 18mph at the time of the collision. It’s implied that figure came from his Garmin.
So, exactly what does Danny Dunning-Kruger MP think would be different in this case if the offence he wants to see introduced had existed? Instead of not being charged with causing bodily harm by “wanton or furious driving or racing, or other wilful misconduct, or by wilful neglect”, he would not have been charged with causing death by dangerous cycling.
Big woop.
Dunning-Kruger also said “action should have been taken much faster to [b]prevent[/b] similar tragedies”. [my emphasis] Because of course the existence of various offences of causing death by driving completely prevents drivers from killing anyone, ever.
It’s the job of an MP to
It’s the job of an MP to raise matters like this, via questions to the government, that a constituent has brought to their attention. That’s just representative democracy in action.
The government announced & ran a 3 month consultation on this specific issue in 2018 https://road.cc/content/news/246592-government-opens-dangerous-and-careless-cycling-law-consultation
Is it really that unreasonable for any MP to ask 4 years later when the DfT intend publishing the outcome of that consultation ?
Especially when the current secretary of state for transport is on record this year as stating he intends to introduce harsher penalties for bike riders who cause death/injury by dangerous cycling, a response which was reiterated in the answer to this MPs direct question, so the DfTs position is already very clear this will happen and this isnt some lone rabid anti cycling MP, this is government policy, the only question is when it will happen, it’s no longer if.
Or, Dunning-Kruger could look
Or, Dunning-Kruger could look at the ridiculous lengths a bereaved constituent has gone to in order to persecute an innocent man and find him some grief counselling.
But no, it’s easier to score cheap tabloid points going after cyclists.
As long as it doesn’t happen
As long as it doesn’t happen before they’ve dealt with other things ahead of it in the queue.
Like the comprehensive road safety review.
It was a “business of the
It was a “business of the house” debate with the leader of the house of commons, MPs get to ask all kind of things, there was a question on speed cameras, a question about sheep shows, a question on youth sporting clubs & to congratulate a constituent on a boxing victory. Not everything they debate in the chamber is as cutting edge top priority as you might think
I don’t think anyone doubts
I don’t think anyone doubts that they do waste a lot of time on trivial things (often in government-sponsored business, never mind what private members raise) – the question is whether they should.
This probably has nothing to
This probably has nothing to do with an MP representing his constituents. As you say the SoS has already said he is favour of this so it is more an example of a junior backbencher nobody has heard of sucking up to more senior members to try and get noticed/ get a job. Compare and contrast with the abject failure of Tory MPs (such as mine) to support the very reasonable and well thought through proposals from Cycling UK to make roads safer.
Well he’s already been a
Well he’s already been a political advisor to the PM I dont think he needs to ask a question, thats critical of the government handling of this consultation, and do read the actual hansard not the tabloid interpretation of it, to get noticed much
Awavey wrote:
Certainly it isn’t unreasonable. Neither would it be unreasonable for him and any other MP interested in road safety to ask when the comprehensive review of road laws, announced all those centuries ago, is going to report; but they don’t.
I wonder if that review’s
I wonder if that review’s been kicked into the long grass because it’s impossible for it to conclude anything but that reducing road danger will involve restrictions on driver behaviour.
So contact your MP to ask
So contact your MP to ask them to raise a question to the DfT about it ?
There are vastly more cases
There are vastly more cases of DBD Driving that need more appropriate sentences.
Please take a moment to read my petition for cyclist safety, both online and onroad. Please share far and wide, with not only cyclists but those who love you. Thank you ?
https://www.change.org/StopCyclistHate
As long as we can have deaths
As long as we can have deaths caused by a poor Tory government too!
It doesn’t seem like the most
It doesn’t seem like the most pressing piece of legislation, given the vanishingly small number of people that would be prosecuted under it. On the other hand, given the vanishingly small number of people who would be prosecuted under it, I can’t say I really care whether they bring it in or not.
Quote:
this is quite intents (especially for the proof readers)
Well spotted, thanks – fixed.
Well spotted, thanks – fixed.
You would of course have to
You would of course have to set the burden of proof at simialr levels to due care and attention and dangerous driving. One might, for example, consider the kinetic energy involved in a collision, in which case I think one would rapidly establish that comparatively speaking there’s no such thing as dangerous cycling….
^^This.^^
^^This.^^
Cyclist ‘misbehaviour’ is extremely self-limiting because the person you’re most likely to harm in a crash is yourself.
And even worse, you might damage your bike.
What about dangerous
What about dangerous pedestrianing? I was hospitalised when I crashed into someone who ran into the road without looking, and I had no time to avoid them. If I’d been seriously injured, or killed, would they have been charged with anything?
the little onion wrote:
Probably not. This pedestrian was bang to rights and never faced justice:
https://road.cc/content/news/219729-reading-cyclist-dies-following-collision-pedestrian
Left pub…crossing road to
Left pub…crossing road to get sweets…police unable to determine if traffic light green or amber…
https://www.gloucestershirelive.co.uk/news/cheltenham-news/keen-accomplished-cheltenham-cyclist-dies-436755
Time CyclingUK updated this data…https://www.cyclinguk.org/campaigning/views-and-briefings/pedestrians
I can excuse the Fb etc ignorance but so called Journalists and MP’s should look at facts…talking about facts I currently live in Aus’ and looked at similar data and 15% of vehicle / pedestrian collisions are hit and run….in the UK?
the little onion wrote:
Having been knocked off three times by pedestrians who ran into me, I could hardly disagree.
Bring the new charge in, but
Bring the new charge in, but make it as onerous to prove as Death by Dangerous Driving.
To be frank ….if you kill someone by doing something dangerous, then you should be able to be prosecuted. It shouldn’t matter if you are on a scooter, bike, mbike, car or truck.
A few years ago, a jogger
A few years ago, a jogger pushed a woman into the bus lane and she narrowly avoided dying. I believe he was never traced. I wonder if they would bring in a charge of Death by Dangerous Jogging if she hadn’t have been so lucky.
If only a PBU were here to
If only a PBU were here to tell us that a top lawyer was advocating bibs with an id on for all citizens. Then the bloke would have been caught.
Maybe … But more likely to
Maybe … But more likely to be manslaughter, or if they can prove pre-meditation, murder.
I know you *probably* had your tongue planted firmly in your check with your comment, but I stand by mine.
No-one should escape prosecution for killing someone through their actions.
Oldfatgit wrote:
That’s just silly. Let’s assume in this case that poor Diana Walker did step into the rider’s path such that he could not possibly avoid a collision. What are you going to prosecute him *for*?
John Stevenson wrote:
But in your scenario it is not the actions of the cyclist that killed her, it was her own actions. Had it been the cyclists actions then the cyclist ought to be accountable.
Sriracha wrote:
Depends on what you mean by an action. He was riding bike down the street. In the eyes of some people, that’s action enough to make it his fault.
Agreed – with the caveat that
Agreed – with the caveat that drivers or their lawyers say the exact same thing when their vehicles hit people. Which – when further facts emerge – often turns out to be “I wasn’t looking / paying attention”.
Also I’d hope the wide-ranging road safety review coming real soon will also consider contributions from bloody stupid design (of carriageway / infra) like “let’s have this footpath crossing the cycle path at the bottom of a hill just after a sharp bend”, or “route the cycle lane round the outside of the parked cars”.
It’s worse than that though,
It’s worse than that though, isn’t it? The momentary lapse of concentration defence is usually a winner. In a car it is seen as quite acceptable that a reasonable and careful driver hasn’t got a clue what is happening 10′ in front of their bonnet.
Indeed, careless driving, which we know can have fatal consequences, is considered a minor thing by the public without them realising it encompasses just about every serious driving offence because the dangerous driving law is so poorly enacted.
This has been picked up by
This has been picked up by the tabloid sites which all go with headlines along the lines of cracking down on killer cyclists (cos there are so many of them, aren’t there…).
Reading some of the stories about the Diana Walker incident shows her widower as going full Matthew Briggs – for example, complaining because he had to do too much digging to find out the name of the killer cyclist who had not been questioned under oath or actually charged with anything
So basically because one of
So basically because one of their constituents was killed by a cyclist, who wasn’t charged with any offences, they wan’t to introduce a charge of causing death by dangerous cycling.
If the cyclist in question had done anything wrong they would have been charged under the wanton and furious cycling surely.
But as @Oldfatgit says if they bring it in it should be treated in the same way as causing death by dangerous driving…. used only for the most serious case where there are multiple aggrevating factors.
I suppose the question comes
I suppose the question comes down to ‘Is Wanton and Furious cycling’ an appropriate charge in all circumstances?
If it’s not, and I don’t think it is, then there is a need for more appropriate legislation.
It wouldn’t necessarily need to take up any additional parliamentary time, could just be incorporated into the imminent overhaul of road traffic offences…
Hopefully within that
Hopefully within that overhaul is a redefinition of what constitutes Dangerous Driving and Careless Driving rather then the really weak definitions at the moment. And consequently a definition on what accounts for Dangerous Cycling and for Careless Cycling (not that they seem to be bringing the latter in).
I’d imagine the two could
I’d imagine the two could have basically the same definitions.
Hopefully a serious injury charge and an automatic lifetime ban for death or serious injury by dangerous driving too.
As we know you can leave
As we know you can leave someone for dead claiming you hit a bollard, fail to stop, fail to report and have no insurance and still have a light sentence (and no jail after appeal).
And there’s no charge of serious injury by careless driving. Seems a far more important thing to focus on.
The charge of Serious Injury
The charge of Serious Injury through Careless Driving is supposedly being brought in. However I’m concerned that they want to bring in Dangerous Cycling charges but no Careless Cycling charges. I mean IF the cyclist in this case was doing over 30mph (and it is a big if being as the Strava Segment KOM is just about that speed along it), why would that be Dangerous Cycling when a driver only gets charged with Careless even though they were doing 40mph in a 30 zone.
AlsoSomniloquism wrote:
He wasn’t, he was doing 18mph according to the statement he gave police.
It’s not clear whether he repeated that statement at the inquest, where as I understand it he’d have been under oath, but his use of a Garmin is mentioned in the context of the inquest, so if there’d been reason to doubt that figure he could have been asked to produce his ride data.
I know he wasn’t, but as this
I know he wasn’t, but as this is a case being stated on why we need a Death by Dangerous Cycling, where is the in between of Death by Careless Cycling that would be the equivalent that drivers seem to get when they go faster then the speed limit and kill a pedestrian.
Gotcha; hadn’t realised you
Gotcha; hadn’t realised you were posing a theoretical, sorry.
You’re right, in principle dangerous cycling should be even harder to prove than dangerous driving, since an 80kg rider and bike inherently presents far less danger than two tonnes of metal and glass.
In practice, Jo DailyMailReader thinks cycling is itself extremely dangerous; you can bet they’ll convict on the flimsiest of premises.
Hoping that the Honourable
Hoping that the Honourable Gentleman of Devizes puts as much effort into seeking justice for the 67 daily KSI’s
Given the depressing lack of
Given the depressing lack of punishment drivers tend to face for offences committed while behind the wheel, such legislation doesn’t feel all that urgent, especially considering the small numbers involved. I am not completely against the idea but I’d want to see a pretty comprehensive overhaul of the way driving offences are handled.
It’s likely to be a very rare scenario but I’d also like to know how this proposed law would be applied in the event of a death caused by a cyclist in a race. Obviously you can’t race cars on the open road (so far as I am aware) but cycling races like TTs and road races are permitted. What if a rider hit a pedestrian who stepped out in front of them in the course of an official event like this and killed them? Will the law consider things like this I wonder?
ooblyboo wrote:
This is probably why nothing has happened after 4 years. Anyone pushing this will be attacked for pandering to the mob and targeting cyclists, unnecessarily. It’s also a very low priority based on the maximum of 4 people they’ll hit with this law in a normal year – and then of those >4 people the charges will unlikely stand up in court for most of them anyway – making this a large white elephant, and a waste of time for all involved while motorists continue to kill hundreds each year and rack up more than 12 points on their licences.