Can we take a lesson from Australia?

[wafflycat]

See

http://www.cyclingnews.com/news.php?id=news/2005/may05/may04news

"Royal Commission into death of Australian cyclist"

"Seemingly lenient treatment by the courts of drivers who kill cyclists is a
long-standing concern of Australian cyclists' rights groups, and the McGee
case has mobilized protests this weekend in South Australian capital
Adelaide and also in Melbourne and Sydney. The protest rides start at 9.30
at Victoria Square, Adelaide; Federation Square, Melbourne and Hyde Park
Fountain, Sydney."

I wonder if this is something we can learn from over here? It'll be
interesting to follow it.

Cheers, helen s

 

[Tony Raven]

wafflycat wrote:
> See
>
> http://www.cyclingnews.com/news.php?id=news/2005/may05/may04news
>
> "Royal Commission into death of Australian cyclist"
>
> "Seemingly lenient treatment by the courts of drivers who kill cyclists
> is a long-standing concern of Australian cyclists' rights groups, and
> the McGee case has mobilized protests this weekend in South Australian
> capital Adelaide and also in Melbourne and Sydney. The protest rides
> start at 9.30 at Victoria Square, Adelaide; Federation Square, Melbourne
> and Hyde Park Fountain, Sydney."
>
> I wonder if this is something we can learn from over here? It'll be
> interesting to follow it.
>
> Cheers, helen s
>

But they have mandatory cycle helmets....what more is there that can be
done?

;-^)

--
Tony

"A facility for quotation covers the absence of original thought" Lord
Peter Wimsey (Dorothy L. Sayers)

 

[Graeme]

"wafflycat" <wafflesATv21netDOTcoDOTuk> wrote in
news:[email protected]:

> I wonder if this is something we can learn from over here? It'll be
> interesting to follow it.

Maybe, but this case got a reasonable amount of publicity (not a lot, but
much more than normal), partly because of who the driver was (lawyer,
fairly well known for defending very iffy characters) and partly because
there'd been a spate of cyclists killed by drivers around the time of the
court case which raised the visibility. There were also other driver caused
deaths, such as the shooting of a policeman with his own gun by somebody
stopped for speeding, which may have increased the publicity of "road
safety" issues generally.

I feel that it is largely because of this publicity that it has become
politically advantageous to be seen to be doing something about it, or at
least asking for something to be done about it. Whether anything does
actually happen is another matter.

Graeme