Want to skip straight to a certain entry? You have these to choose from:
1. “You don’t even pay Road tax…”
2. “I have a right to drive on the roads!”
3. “Cyclists should be forced to carry insurance.”
4. “Cyclists should be registered and have number plates.”
5. “Cyclists shouldn’t ride 2 abreast.”
6. “Cyclists don’t even use cycle lanes.”
Whenever I engage with people that don’t really understand the rules of the roads, or how to behave around vulnerable road users, I’m usually having the same old debates and debunking the same old myths and misunderstandings. To reduce the time I spend doing this rather tedious exercise, I’m writing this entry so that people can be pointed to it. Its not just for me, it’s for you too if you’re spending too much time explaining things over and over, or if you’re up for a bit of light reading where you might learn something new.
So, let’s dive in, and first off, we’ll be dealing with the myth that is Road tax…
1. “You don’t even pay Road tax…”
Also referred to as Road Fund or Road Fund License, this made-up tax doesn’t exist at all, yet social media and the real world is full of twerps insisting that they pay it. Road tax was abolished in 1937 and even before that, motorists only paid a fraction of the costs of the roads. What people pay now is VED, that’s Vehicle Excise Duty, which is essentially a pollution tax used to “… to incentivise uptake of the very cleanest cars…”.
The roads are paid for via general taxation, meaning all of us pay for them; people using bikes, horses, on foot or driving. VED has nothing to do with funding roads. There are plenty of people without cars that subsidise drivers.
So, if you’re going around saying that roads are funded by drivers, and they should have priority over people on foot, horses or bikes, you can go and do one.
Need convincing? Here’s what the DVLA says:
Tax dodging cyclists
Some people will say that people in cars have more right to the roads as they’re taxed and that people on bikes (or horses, or on foot) are tax-dodgers, but this is rubbish too, since there are lots of people using cars that aren’t paying tax, like band A vehicles (EVs for example), along with many other vehicles that drivers use. See below for a list of “tax-dodgers”:
- Cars built before 1937 – there are hundreds of thousands of these.
- Ex-soldiers who have a VED-waiving WPA442 form – tens of thousands of them.
- Police cars, fire-engines, and ambulances and other health-service vehicles – hundreds of thousands of these.
- Road construction vehicles and gritters.
- The King.
- Tractors and other agricultural vehicles.
People on bikes and people in band A cars (both emitting between 0 and 100g/km of CO2) are exempt from paying this pollution tax, since their level of pollution is deemed too low to justify taxation. the same can be assumed of our lovely people on horses and people on foot.
So, if you bang on about horse riders or cyclists, or even pedestrians being freeloaders, remember to mention The King and all the other road users listed above on your social media account.
Hot on the heels of “You don’t even pay Road tax…”, is usually this one:
2. “I have a right to drive on the roads!”
This is a misunderstanding – when we drive our cars on the roads, we do so because we’re licenced to do so, and this licence is revokeable (i.e. you can be banned from driving on public roads). You can’t be banned from riding a horse, walking, or going out on your bike on the roads. Why? Well, that’s because horse riders, pedestrians and cyclists have a right to use the roads, not there by licence, but by right; a right is irrevokeable. Why is this? Well, its because people on horses, people on bikes and people on foot are benign road users, i.e. broadly speaking they present very little danger to others. Proof of that is here.
This often gets mentioned, too:
3. “Cyclists should be forced to carry insurance.”
The reason that we need insurance when driving is that we’re piloting a heavy piece of metal around at elevated speeds – hit something and you’re almost certainly going to damage or kill it.
There are plenty of reports you can look at that show how few people are killed by people on bikes, on foot and on horses – there aren’t many. This is why vulnerable road users don’t need insurance; they’re just not risky enough.
Here’s a very handy document to illustrate just how benign vulnerable road users are:
So, they’re not killing enough people or causing enough damage to property to warrant insurance. Get used to that and worry about people in cars.
Even funnier is the fact that most adults on bikes are insured through their home contents insurance – many insurers give this away for free because they know there’s very little chance that a claim will be submitted. Moreover, many adults on bikes have bespoke isnurance policies that are pretty affordable.
4. “Cyclists should be registered and have number plates.”
This is usually trotted out by people that have never really looked into the viability of such a system, or ever wondered if its already been considered by the government. Well, it has.
This was brought into clear focus when Nick Freeman, (he’s the Manchester lawyer to the rich and famous, getting people like Alex Ferguson, David Beckham, Van Morrison, Ian Brown and Jimmy Carr off the hook for their misdemeanors behind the wheel), started a petition in 2021: “Introduce new requirements for cyclists/e-scooters: visible ID, licences, etc”.
This clown is quite happy getting dangerous, law-breaking drivers off the hook but spends his spare time hating on benign road users that are not breaking the law by being unregistered, or killing people like dangerous drivers are.
It scraped past 10,000 signatures, prompting a response for the government, summarised like this:
The Government has no plans to introduce any such requirements for cyclists. The current trials of rental e-scooters will inform future policy on them.
Petition response.
The full response from the government is below:
The Government considers that the costs of a formal registration system for cycle ownership would outweigh the benefits. The safety case for such a system is not as strong as that for drivers since, by contrast with motorised vehicles, cycles involved in collisions on the highway are highly unlikely to cause serious injury to other road users…
Cycling provides clear benefits, both for those cycling (particularly in terms of health) and for wider society (tackling congestion, reducing CO2 emissions and improved air quality). The introduction of a licensing system would significantly reduce these benefits, especially over the short term. Over the long term, it would deny children and young adults from enjoying the mobility and health benefits cycling brings until they were old enough to pass a formal test.
The introduction of a system of licensing would also be likely to lead to a reduction in the number of people cycling. This would be at odds with the Prime Minister’s plans to boost walking and cycling. The Prime Minister’s Cycling and Walking Plan (Gear Change) can be viewed here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/cycling-and-walking-plan-for-england.
Furthermore, the National Travel Survey indicates that a very high proportion of people who cycle regularly also hold a driving licence. The absence of a licensing system does not prevent a cyclist from being liable for their actions. The police and ultimately the courts, can take into account all the circumstances of an incident and judge accordingly.
Cycle lanes, where provided, offer people cycling an alternative to cycling in the main carriageway, but it is not compulsory to use them and the Government has no plans to change this. The majority of people cycling generally use cycle lanes, but there are times when it may be more appropriate for them to use the main carriageway, such as when they are overtaking slower people cycling or avoiding obstructions on the cycle lane, or where it offers a faster, more direct route.
The Government has announced ambitious plans for walking and cycling, and has committed an unprecedented £2 billion of funding for active travel over 5 years which includes the roll-out of segregated cycle lanes in towns and cities and offering cycle training to everyone who wants to undertake it, whether free or at a nominal charge. This investment coupled with the recently announced changes to The Highway Code will deliver increased safety for the most vulnerable road users and ensure a more mutually respectful and considerate culture of safe and effective road use that benefits all users.
The Government is currently running trials of rental e-scooters to assess their safety and the impacts they have on the road and to inform the development of future policy. 31 trial areas are currently operating across England.
Trial e-scooters are limited to 15.5 mph and are exempted from vehicle registration and licensing requirements. E-scooters must not be used on pavements. Those taking part in the trials need a full or provisional driving licence, meaning that the minimum age of those using the scooters should be 16 years old. Cycle helmets are strongly recommended but are not mandatory. All trial e-scooters must meet minimum construction standards and have a minimum of third-party insurance provided by the e-scooter operator.
Guidance on the rules for trials has been published at: www.gov.uk/guidance/e-scooter-trials-guidance-for-users.
Outside of the rental trials, e-scooters are still subject to the Road Traffic Act 1988 and are defined as a type of motor vehicle. Users of e-scooters will need to have insurance, driving licences, number plates and helmets, and the vehicles will need to meet the relevant construction requirements. The law was not drafted with e-scooters in mind, so users of e-scooters will find it a challenge to comply. Guidance on this can be found at: www.gov.uk/government/publications/powered-transporters/information-sheet-guidance-on-powered-transporters.
Department for Transport
5. Cyclists shouldn’t ride two abreast
Another load of old tosh that gets trotted out by people like Pauline Jackson here on Facebook:
Poor Pauline has also fallen for the ‘registration‘ and ‘insurance‘ myths: both disproved above, but who could settle the ‘two abreast’ argument for us? I know, how about The actual Police schooling another Pauline that doesn’t know what she’s talking about? Perfect!
Pretty clear then. As for body shaming people in Lycra that are getting fit, reducing congestion, reducing pollution, reducing danger on our roads, improving public health, saving the NHS time and money, reducing the decimation of wildlife? Tut, tut, Pauline 🙁
6. “Cyclists don’t even use cycle lanes.”
Another gripe for Pauline (and many others), but this one is very easy to disprove – you just need to look at The Highway Code to see that cycle lanes are not mandatory, but obligatory.
Rule 61. Cycle Routes and Other Facilities. Cycle lanes are marked by a white line (which may be broken) along the carriageway (see Rule 140). Use facilities such as cycle lanes and tracks, advanced stop lines and toucan crossings (see Rules 62 and 73) where they make your journey safer and easier. This will depend on your experience and skills and the situation at the time. While such facilities are provided for reasons of safety, cyclists may exercise their judgement and are not obliged to use them.
The Highway Code, September 2022.
So, people like our friend Pauline need to get it into their heads that cyclists don’t have to use cycle lanes if they don’t want to.
So, there you have it. If you don’t agree with any of these rules, start lobbying your MP and stop crying about it on social media. This is like me saying I think people in yellow shirts should be banned. Get real.
Well, that’ll do for now, If anything else turns up, I’ll add it. Feel free to add your thoughts in the comments.
Excellent! The only thing I would add to that right now is the cycling demographic will include a higher proportion of educated and affluent members of society when compared to the knuckle dragging, inarticulate, semi-literate anti-cycling brigade. I conclude the former population pays significantly more of all forms of taxation than the latter group, none of whom I would employ in my business.