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18 Sep 2023

Sustrans are calling on schools and families across the UK to take part in Cycle to School Week from 25 to 29 September to experience how travelling actively can be healthy, cheap and fun.

18 Sep 2023

New statistics showing a 5% fall in cycling from last year should be a “wake-up call for the government” and are due to the Government's "flawed" decision to slash the...

18 Sep 2023

The government’s Active Lives Survey has revealed that, in 2022, Cambridge (50%), Oxford (35%), Isles of Scilly (30%), Hackney (28%), and Southwark (25%) were the five local authorities in...

18 Sep 2023

ACT member Balfe’s Bikes has begun its plan to introduce Cytech apprentices to its stores and upskill existing staff through the Cytech training programme.

15 Sep 2023

The team from Whistler Adventure School (WAS), which recently became the only centre in Canada accredited to offer Cytech technical three, is to deliver a series of free sessions in Scotland,...

6 Sep 2023

Offers designed to help Londoners 'make the green transition' following the expansion of the ultra low emission zone (ULEZ) last month include a range of discounts, offers or trials available...

6 Sep 2023

A new report on the state of the UK cycle industry suggests that bike sales have fallen once again, months after it was reported that they had fallen to a 20-year low in 2022.

6 Sep 2023

Rebecca, staff member with the ACT has released an EP on the music platform Spotify, with popular local band Thee Derelique.

5 Sep 2023

Small and medium sized retailers who may be struggling amid current economic challenges have been offered an opportunity to share their stories on TV.

5 Sep 2023

A Government energy efficiency campaign has been launched to help SME businesses across the UK to both better understand and reduce their energy usage - and in turn reduce their energy bills....

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Legislate to close ‘hardship loophole’ to keep all road users safe, Cycling UK demands

Posted on in Cycles News , Outdoor News

Cycling charity Cycling UK has renewed its call on the Government to close the loophole in the law which allows people to escape driving bans.

Hardship loopholeCurrently, drivers who have 12 penalty points on their licence, which would normally result in a temporary driving ban, can avoid a ban by claiming it would cause them “exceptional hardship”.

Cycling UK has calculated more than 83,000 drivers with 12 points or more have escaped disqualification in the past ten years. In October 2020, the Sentencing Council issued guidance for magistrates which was intended to reduce the number of offenders with totting up offences who avoided disqualification.

As reported in the Sunday Times, since those changes, the Sentencing Council said it has been suggested by some magistrates and legal advisers that courts are too often imposing short discretionary disqualifications (of less than 56 days) where people have received 12 or more points.

Duncan Dollimore, Cycling UK’s head of campaigns, said: “The Sentencing Council’s report shows we now have a loophole within a loophole. The result is people who should be facing six-month or longer driving bans are continuing to pose a risk on our roads, often with fatal results.”

The Sentencing Council cannot enact legislative change, but only issue guidance to magistrates to follow. Cycling UK says that with evidence the guidance is ‘failing’, the Government must enact necessary legislation to keep all road users safe.

Dollimore said: “For the past eight years we have been promised by successive ministers a review of Road Traffic Offences and Sentencing. This review, if it ever begins, could put an end to the fatal flaws, like the exceptional hardship loophole, in our current road safety legislation.

“Exceptional hardship is not losing the right to drive, exceptional hardship is what families such as Louis McGovern’s and Lee Martin’s have to face when their loved ones do not return home. Exceptional hardship is when the courts put the retention of someone’s licence to drive above the safety of other road users. Exceptional hardship is when the courts allow irresponsible people to carry on driving until they cause further harm or death on the roads.

“The law as it is, does not deliver justice and fails to reduce danger on our roads. For more than eight years the government has recognised our road traffic laws failing – it’s about time they brought in their much-needed change.”

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