Lords rejects bill to give PCSOs power to fine reflectorless cyclists amid civil liberties concerns

+1 for 3M diamond grade reflector tape. You can even get a version in black (3M Scotchlite Black) so it doesn't spoil your all-black bike. I don't see any disadvantage to being more visible at night.

Lord Dear's amendment has ONLY amended the part of the Bill that would have introduced IPNAS (Injunctions to Prevent Nuisance and Annoyance) to replace ASBOs.

Personally, I'd completely agree that this is very good news for civil liberties!

However it has no bearing on the rest of the Bill, e.g. the part that gives PCSOs new powers to enforce various traffic offences (including the regs on cyclists' lights and reflectors).

That part of the Bill is now set to be debated later this month, probably on January 20th or 22nd.

The amendments, to be tabled by Lord Berkeley (who is a CTC Vice-President and secretary of the All Party Parliamentary Cycling Group) will seek to ensure that the reflector regs are either updated before PCSOs are given the power to enforce them, or else deleted. We will also seek to ensure that Advance Stop Lines can be enforced by PCSOs (along with red light jumping, bus lanes and cycle lanes - these too are now covered by the Bill, following an earlier Goverment amendment in the Lords), and that PCSOs are given adequate training in traffic law and cycle safety.

CTC welcomes stronger enforcement of road traffic law - after all, that is a key objective of our Road Justice campaign (www.roadjustice.org.uk). However traffic law enforcement needs to be guided by real road safety priorities, and not the vindictiveness of some local politicians or the petty ignorance of some police officers/PCSOs.

Roger Geffen
Campaigns & Policy Director
CTC, the national cycling charity

And I will continue to have my opinion on PCSO's they are simply wanabe police officers who failed to make the grade.

and what about riders who naturally pedal heel down ??

As already noted ... speedplay users are in trouble !

I can't believe the number of negative comments about PCSOs on this item. As a PCSO and a cyclist I take road safety very seriously. However, I can assure cyclists that PCSOs have better and more important things to do than issue Fixed Penalty Tickets to cyclists with no reflectors.

I'm more concerned about the number of cyclists who ride at night and poor visibility conditions with no lights. At the moment I stop them and give them words of advice. If I could issue a ticket I probably wouldn't as I would rather the cyclist spent their money on a set of lights than a £50 fine. I even secured some funding and bought lights that I give out to young cyclists.

If PCSOs are told to clamp-down on cyclists riding on the pavements or who have no lights then this has come from our Police Officer Managers.

So before you slate PCSOs, we are only doing our job and we would rather stop a cyclist and educate them than give out penalty fines.

Isn't headlamp use by cars optional in areas with streetlamps? Just where are cyclists being fined for not having lights? Sort of odd bicycles must use lights but not cars (in areas lit by street lamps).

https://www.gov.uk/general-rules-all-drivers-riders-103-to-158/lighting-...

It's a shame the opportunity to inject some common sense into the regulations was missed. As far as reflectors go, as we know many clipless pedals have no reflector option or ones that don't work very well. Is there some evidence that reflector pedals have magical anti-accident properties? I suspect other EU countries do not mandate their use - that would explain why some SPD pedals I order come with reflectors - some without.

Why not something along the line of - "bicycles ridden at night must have a red reflector to the rear, measuring X sq mm or more and visible at a height of Y at a distance of Z" (and so on).

Similarly, pedal reflectors could be described so that tape of reflective patches on shoes or trouser legs (clips, etc.) would be acceptable. Being so specific just allows those jobsworthy coppers (not suggesting all are like that) to write up their ten tickets a month all at once.

No room for these on speed plays tho!

there is no provision in the law for the size of said reflector, I propose a Road.cc startup on some crowdfunding site of a 1mm square reflector

There are very ugly, easily broken screw on reflectors for SPD-SL. Not easy to get hold of. Very very easy to kick off.

The pedal reflectors requirement is a farce and everybody knows it.

My (inexpensive but serviceable) hybrid came with pedal reflectors which fell off in under a month.

When I took it in for its free one month "bedding in" service I made them replace the reflectors just to make the point. They did so, but predictably the new ones didn't last any longer.

A pointless waste of everyone's time and money.

Get a fine for no reflectors but no prosecution for driver that dont indicate or such... #laughable

The pedal reflector issue is so outdated... my jacket, bib-tights, shoes (and shoe covers) all have reflective material on them.

Good.

"Nuisance and annoyance" would be very hard to pin down in court - and therefore open to so much interpretation by the PCSOs in the wild that it would become ridiculous. Whereas "harassment, alarm or distress" is much clearer.

Having said that I'd happily put an ASBO on anyone going trick or treating.

The CSO's where i work are spot on a do a hell of a lot of good work and are a massive asset to us.

Of course people who dont work in the Police have very little knowledge of the work they do carry out because its not up front and in your face.

Sorry. Now amended my story. Turns out #reflectorgate wasn't part of last night's defeat. Grrr. (Still good for civil liberties, of course).

http://www.bikebiz.com/news/read/lords-reject-reflectorgate-bill-because...

About the only use I can see for PCSO's (or Bless em's as I once heard them being called) is help little old ladies cross the road.

My SPD's dont have reflectors..

Good.