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news
BBC e-bike Panorama - wheelie“E-bikes are not illegal”: BBC hit with more complaints about “misleading and damaging” Panorama e-bike episode, as cycle shop owner says: “Finding a wolf in sheep’s clothing should not be a reason to attack sheep”
Almost two weeks since the BBC aired its controversial, Adrian Chiles-fronted Panorama episode on e-bikes, the complaints keep flooding into the broadcaster, after the owner of an e-bike shop branded the programme “troubling” and “misleading”, with the potential to “unfairly influence public opinion and undermine the efforts of responsible retailers who prioritise safety, respectful riding, and adherence to the law”.
A formal complaint lodged to the BBC this week by Ray Wookey, the owner of Energise E-Bikes in the south London town of Coulsdon, claimed the programme offered a “negative portrayal” of electric bikes by showing “very few legitimate e-bikes shown on-screen” – instead focusing on illegally modified or unregistered ‘e-motorbikes’.
Wookey argued that the use of the phrase “illegal e-bikes” is “misleading and damaging”, and has the effect of cementing in the public’s mind that all e-bikes are illegal, and that the general “imbalance” evident in the episode has the potential to “hurt trustworthy electric bike businesses”.
He also noted that while focusing on road safety issues – such as the relationship between e-bike riders and pedestrians – is important, it “should not involve the misrepresentation of an important and fast-growing sector” capable of promoting a safe, healthy, and environmentally-friendly form of transport.
Last week, the BBC found itself on the receiving end of a furious backlash from cycling groups after it aired the Panorama episode, ‘E-Bikes: The Battle For Our Streets’, hosted by Adrian Chiles, which saw the former One Show host ask whether electric bikes are “a new menace in need of tighter regulation”.
The episode’s prolonged focus on modified e-bikes – which exceed the maximum 250 watts and 15.5mph cut-off speed for electrically assisted pedal cycles (EAPCs) permitted under UK law to ride on public roads – and the failure to consistently and fully distinguish between these machines proved controversial, however, provoking some strong criticism from cycling campaigners and bike industry groups.
“Panorama confuses legal with illegally modified e-bikes and ignores their benefits compared to the UK’s car use,” the London Cycling Campaign said in response to the episode, which many cyclists criticised for its conflation of the criminality, dangerous riding, and battery fires associated with illegally modified two-wheeled electric vehicles with legal e-bikes.
“If we switched lots of cars for e-bikes in the UK we’d see health, crime, road danger, and climate benefits, not the tabloid, crime-ridden, apocalyptic vision Panorama paints,” the group said.
Referring to the programme’s attempt to discover whether e-bike use is linked to dangerous riding and criminality, Alex Bowden, in his review for road.cc’s sister site e-biketips, said: “Clearly there are specific issues which nebulous questioning and imprecise categorisation won’t do much to resolve.
“Maybe we’re biased but ‘What can we do about e-bikes?’ and ‘What can we do about illegal e-bikes?’ are not to us the same question.”
Meanwhile, the Bicycle Association (BA), the trade organisation representing 140 cycling companies in the UK, and the Association of Cycle Traders both lodged formal complaints with the BBC concerning Panorama’s coverage of e-bikes.
The Bicycle Association’s technical and policy director Peter Eland called on the BBC to “remove ‘E-bikes’ from the episode title and instead reference what the group terms ‘illegal e-motorbikes’,” and in future programming on the subject to “make it fully clear and properly inform the public that e-bikes and illegal e-motorbikes are two entirely separate categories”.
He also urged the broadcaster more generally to “provide proper balance when addressing contentious transport issues, including featuring representation by responsible organisations in the sector”.
According to the association, the Panorama episode “repeatedly conflates the safety and social issues surrounding the use of illegal e-motorbikes with ‘e-bikes’ and fails to make it clear that these issues are overwhelmingly not caused by (road legal) e-bikes.”
This “misrepresentation”, the BA claimed, failed to properly inform the public of the current laws on e-bikes in the UK and has “unjustifiably damaged” the electric bike sector.
Jonathan Harrison, the director of the Association for Cycle Traders, also criticised the “division” the episode “tried to sow” and asked: “Does the hysteria match the actual harm caused?”
And now, independent bike shop owners are adding their voice to the industry’s chorus of disapproval, as Energise founder Ray Wookey lodged his own formal complaint and called on the BBC to “provide a more balance perspective” on the safety issues surrounding e-bikes in the future.
“While the programme intended to raise awareness about safety issues, I found the lack of representation from reputable and legitimate e-bike retailers troubling and potentially misleading,” the Croydon-based retailer, who has sold e-bikes to the Metropolitan Police during his 15 years in business, said in the complaint, titled ‘E-bikes are not illegal’.
“Naturally, the safety of road users is the most important thing, but highlighting danger should not involve the misrepresentation of an important and fast-growing sector.
“Up and down the UK, there are reputable retailers of electric bikes, many of which are independent, locally owned small businesses. Each of these establishments helps to increase the amount of healthy, eco-friendly travel in their communities through the sale of safe and legal products.
“By not including interviews with credible e-bike retailers or industry experts – and instead speaking to a so-called ‘e-bike collector’ – the programme failed to present balanced information. Such imbalance can unfairly influence public opinion and undermine the efforts of responsible retailers who prioritise safety, respectful riding, and adherence to the law.”
The complaint continued: “The negative portrayal of e-bikes without input from legitimate retailers may harm the industry, potentially affecting small businesses and employees reliant on this growing market.
“You may also like to consider that the majority of two-wheeled vehicles featured in the episode were in fact not e-bikes at all, but ‘unregistered e-motorbikes’ which have been mis-labelled as ‘e-bikes’, firstly by unscrupulous retailers and secondly by the programme itself.
“There were very few legitimate e-bikes shown on-screen, which again is an imbalance that will hurt trustworthy electric bike businesses.
“Repeated use of the phrase ‘illegal e-bikes’ is misleading and damaging. Using this phrasing, or similar, could persuade members of the public that all e-bikes are illegal, when in fact the problem is ‘unregistered e-mopeds’.
“Finding a wolf in sheep’s clothing should not be a reason to attack sheep. Call a wolf, a wolf, and call an unregistered e-motorbikes, an unregistered e-motorbikes.
“I kindly request that you consider these points and take steps to address the imbalance in future reporting. Providing a more balanced perspective, including input from reputable e-bike retailers, and using accurate language, will ensure a fair and informative presentation of the topic.”
After obtaining a PhD, lecturing, and hosting a history podcast at Queen’s University Belfast, Ryan joined road.cc in December 2021 and since then has kept the site’s readers and listeners informed and enthralled (well at least occasionally) on news, the live blog, and the road.cc Podcast. After boarding a wrong bus at the world championships and ruining a good pair of jeans at the cyclocross, he now serves as road.cc’s senior news writer. Before his foray into cycling journalism, he wallowed in the equally pitiless world of academia, where he wrote a book about Victorian politics and droned on about cycling and bikes to classes of bored students (while taking every chance he could get to talk about cycling in print or on the radio). He can be found riding his bike very slowly around the narrow, scenic country lanes of Co. Down.
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83 comments
It's a label. To the average person in the street, if it looks like a bike and is electric, it's an e-bike. If it looks like a scooter and is electric, it's an e-scooter. Same for motorbikes and motor scooters.
If the average person in the street is terrorised by an electric two wheeled device that looks like a bicycle but it's going very fast and faster than it should be legally, they are going to think we have a problem with illegal e-bikes. And I'm with them on that front. As far as I'm concerned, we do have a problem with illegal e-bikes! Things that look like motorcycles and are electric aren't a problem, no matter what they are called.
Only nerdish electric bicycle apologists are going to get upset about the Panorama report. Do we have a problem with people riding electric two wheeled conveyances illegally? Yes we bloody well do. Now shut up and get on with trying to find a way to prevent illegal "e-biking" rather than arguing about what they are called!
Living up to your name again with another pile of...electric motorcycles that look like dirtbikes, such as the one in the picture at the top of this page, are a huge problem in many suburban areas. Models in the Sur-Ron range can do up to 68mph and are used by youths terrorising estates, tearing up recreation grounds etc and also in the commission of crimes (road.cc has already reported on their use in attempted bike jackings).
Probably right though that public (not cycling) is going to think what they think - and the media will "merely reflect popular understanding".
Those who are triggered as usual will be the last to learn.
On balance worthwhile to correct this - but may be a losing battle and just make us pedants at best.
Although I had a (pleasant) chat with a chap commenting on my "electric bike" (it has a slightly oversize down tube and hub gear with a black shell at rear). He was quite surprised to find that it only *produced* electricity (dynamo) and was actually powered by cake (croissant that day).
But the language is important. An e-bike with a motor over 250W, or that doesn't cut out automatically at 15.5mph, is a motorcycle. Some of these e-motorcycles might look indistinguishable from a pedelec, but their higher performance is usually an obvious giveaway. Plus the fact the rider is not pedalling.
so those things you claim are 'terrorising' people are NOT e-bikes they are illegal e-motorcycles. So the whole premis of the Panorama programme is incorrect.
Between failing to distinguish kids pedal cars from cars, and failing to distinguish illegal (unregistered / no MOT) cars from cars.
"We have a problem" - well, I don't see why we should have these things added to our woes either - but don't tell the OP about scrambler bikes, or good old stolen motorbikes... (like what have actually been involved in deaths in Edinburgh).
Or ... actual cars.
Do they look like bicycles? I think they mostly look like Mopeds. Think 50cc 70s Puch. I think the average person can distinguish between the design of many e-motorbikes and a pedal assisted e-bike.
Quite a lot of them here in Bristol look like cheap MTBs with batteries duck-taped into the frame triangle.
Quite a lot of them here in Bristol look like cheap MTBs with batteries duck-taped into the frame triangle
It's a bit classier up here- I think the one in my photo below is using a frame bag. I haven't seen any looking like mopeds, and there were a lot of illegals at Blackpool's Ride the Lights.
It seems I don't have any pictures of the fat-tyre-no-pedalling illegals at Ride the Lights, I've only got a scooter, so you can have this instead
Even if the general public cannot differentiate these categories, which public service broadcaster has a mission to educate and inform the public rather than accept general ignorance?
Better Be Careful expecting licence renewal when you don't fulfil your public service obligations!
As a community, we should probably abandon the category 'e-bike' because it has no legal definition and is too broad.
Instead, use either EAPC or electric motorbike or moped.
An EAPC has a strict definition in law being restricted to 250 Watts, 15.5.mph and pedal assist, in general.
Anything else is a motor vehicle and nothing to do with us cyclists.
The vast majority of 'e-bikes' razzing about and causing problems are motorbikes and need licence, insurance and registration.
Make them a problem of the motoring community, instead.
The citizenrider blog always refers to them as "smokeless mopeds".
“If it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, then it probably is a duck”. When I was teen the first FS1E's had pedals and with a lot of phaffing around, in theory, you could, supposedly, pedal it (which was a requirement of a moped back then). In practice though it was a motorbike and to the general public it passed the duck test. Today the same general public applies that to ebikes. If it looks like a push bike, albeit an elctric one and on steroids, it's a push bike.
Back then myself and my gang of fellow reprobates rode like lunatics terrorising the local on our sixteener specials. We weren't kids giving mopeds a bad name, we were kids giving motorbikes as bad name. The same applies to high powered ebike now.
Scooters/e-scooters/motor-scooters, what are you talking about. Perfect example of misusing a label. They mean completely different things to different people in different countries and regions of the UK.
Now do some programs telling us how dangerous car and van drivers are and compare the number of people killed and injured by cars and vans with e-bikes.
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cz0lldd30xlo
Interestingly, this article is featured on the BBC site. I look forward to a coruscating episode of Panorama in which all EVs are judged on the basis of this incident.
This was just a really poor programme, as so much of the BBC's output across platforms now is. Chiles is a very average journo - his Guardian column usually reads like one of those "what I did in my holidays" essays we used to get forced to write in primary school. Serious factual stuff is totally beyond him.
He's only got the job because he's the partner of the editor.
The headline tells you everything you need to know about BBC bias.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c4gzppd0ejyo
Language is the tool of journalism and phrasing tells you all you need to know about the attitudes on view.
It doesn't coun't though, because they've put those little disavowal marks on it - the headline writer's equivalent of BOLAs.
"The problem centres on modern vehicles being wider due to the introduction of side impact protection technology,"
So nothing to do with the Seriously Useless Vehicle (SUV) preference of big auto then..
Obviously taking up more space on the public highway should have no consequences for the selfish. /s
They don't need new laws. They just need to enforce the laws they already have. If anything the laws need to be loosened. Why is the speed limited to 25 km per hour but in North America it is 32 km per hour?
If anything the laws need to be loosened
Oh no they don't!
Yeah! Also - I can carry around a machine gun * in much of the USA - what do you mean there are some silly regulations stopping me doing so here?
* Or even this fantastic revolving cannon, which legally is not even a "firearm" at all according to some laws there I am told (historic artefact - as long as you use black powder and don't use the original exploding ammo that is)? Obviously with a few helpers though!
I think it would make sense to have 32km/h. With so many roads switching to 20mph speed limits it would allow e-bikes to become part of the traffic, rather than still being seen as an obstacle. A large portion of my London commute is now on 20mph roads. If I'm on my normal bike it is fine (albeit with some speeding cars desperate to get past), but as soon as I'm on my electric you can sense the urgency to get past at any cost.
In America the e-bike can do 30mph can't they? Certainly when I was chatting with a policeman at the airport in Las Vegas he said his one did 30. I wouldn't suggest a need for that fast, but definitely 20 makes sense.
Class 1 and 2, 30 km/h (18.6 MPH), class 3 is 45 km/h (28 MPH.) I think class 1 at 30 km/h with pedal assist is fine, pretty comparable to what a fit amateur can do, although most people can't do that for a couple of hours like they can on an e-bike.
Im mostly against faster ebikes just for the sake of it but this in conjunction with a heavy information and enforcement campaign (against both rogue drivers and rogue cyclists) could be revolutionary. Needs some joined up thinking at National and Local level and the appropriate funding.
It should be done with 1 piece of legislation and plently of carrots and sticks for local councils to comply.
Im mostly against faster ebikes just for the sake of it
Whereas I, in contrast, am adamantly against faster ebikes just for the sake of it
We've all seen your speeds on upride.cc
You know you need one , you're just in denial!! 😜
The solution there is to lower the speed limit for all vehicles to 15mph, if it's too fast for a bike it's certainly too fast for a multi ton vehicle piloted by a mobile user
On the face of it a reasonable argument. However the performance yardstick by which ebikes [EAPCs] are judged is not motor vehicles but ordinary bicycles. And if ebikes are to continue being treated in legislation the same [all but] as ordinary bicycles then that link must not be broken.
It might seem reasonable to loosen the legislation to allow ebikes to keep up with motor vehicles, but then expect the clamour for them to be regulated as such to grow ever louder.
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