Euro threat to biking

Motorcycling itself is under threat from an attack of ‘Euro lunacy’, according to the UK’s bike industry.

Europe’s Transport Committee has voted to approve tough new restrictions on routes to your licence. They will have a “fundamentally damaging effect on the motorcycle industry and create more barriers for people who want to ride motorcycles, scooters and mopeds,” warns the Motorcycle Industry Association’s Craig Carey-Clinch.

The vote threatens to restrict riders to 125s until they are at least 19 and rule out Direct Access to bigger bikes for anyone under 25. Currently you can do a Direct Access test aged 21 and move to bigger-than-125s at 19.

New car drivers will also lose the right to ride mopeds with a full car licence (after doing a CBT) if the committee vote is rubber-stamped by the full Parliament, next month.

Carey-Clinch said; “The situation is fast becoming Euro Lunacy. The Commission never bothered to evaluate the need to change the licensing regime, simply justifying their proposals with the rather nebulous reason that they were required ‘for safety reasons’.

“They didn’t use evidence to back their arguments. Their so-called ‘safety’ logic is flawed.

“They seem to be grabbing ideas and proposals out of thin air on almost a daily basis, with absolutely no logic to guide their thinking. Now this mish-mash of proposals and counter proposals, which has zero relevance to the real motorcycle safety situation, is in danger of becoming a European law.

“If the European Institutions had deliberately planned to launch a fundamental attack on motorcycling, and in the process secure the primacy of the car as the number one choice for European citizens as a mode of transport on congested roads, it couldn’t have done a better job.”

Carey-Clinch added; “It seems utterly daft that we’re moving to a situation where the requirements for novice motorcyclists could become tougher than those for novice aircraft pilots – who can gain a pilot’s licence from the age of 16.”

Once the European Parliament has voted in February, effectively passing a non-binding opinion on the Directive, it will pass back to the Council of Ministers (representatives of EU member governments) who will decide whether or not to accept the Parliament’s view.