New Licensing Laws

Originally Posted by bikageboy

isnt the majority of biker casualties the born again bikers ?

You obviously havent been reading SS on visordown recently have you? :P

Youngsters are the highest two wheeled casualties, followed by the born agains.

Everyone says how unfair it is. But just stop for one moment and think. Even if they impose the same rules on car drivers it doesnt make anyone less vulnerable.

What makes us less vulnerable is OUR experience and developing OUR skills. Even if the driving standards were improved, we need to address some of the stupidity that a number of bikers display.

Soho is being disrupted by some antisocial individuals, the police are probably going to clamp down at the ace because of the bimbo on the R1. We as a group do not help ourselves or show that we can be trusted to ride sensibly and safely when the minority who are accident statistics waiting to happen is what the governments care about.

At the end of the day I really cant see why people oppose this given we really need to stop the stupidity of putting a 170bhp bike capable of 200mph [or near enough] in the hands of a 21 year old after a 3 day DAS.

Originally Posted by lynw

You obviously havent been reading SS on visordown recently have you? :P

Youngsters are the highest two wheeled casualties, followed by the born agains.

Everyone says how unfair it is. But just stop for one moment and think. Even if they impose the same rules on car drivers it doesnt make anyone less vulnerable.

What makes us less vulnerable is OUR experience and developing OUR skills. Even if the driving standards were improved, we need to address some of the stupidity that a number of bikers display.

Soho is being disrupted by some antisocial individuals, the police are probably going to clamp down at the ace because of the bimbo on the R1. We as a group do not help ourselves or show that we can be trusted to ride sensibly and safely when the minority who are accident statistics waiting to happen is what the governments care about.

At the end of the day I really cant see why people oppose this given we really need to stop the stupidity of putting a 170bhp bike capable of 200mph [or near enough] in the hands of a 21 year old after a 3 day DAS.

to be honest, i havent been reading it

Originally Posted by lynw

At the end of the day I really cant see why people oppose this given we really need to stop the stupidity of putting a 170bhp bike capable of 200mph [or near enough] in the hands of a 21 year old after a 3 day DAS.

We dont really need to stop the stupidity of stopping 21 year olds getting busas and the like. Even if we assume that it's the governments business to interfere, which it isnt, 21 year olds on busas dont make up a significant proportion of casualties. 21 year olds may, but not on powerful bikes. You only need to look at scoot riders who are quite capable of getting themselves killed on machines with 5bhp for evidence of that.

Gnan: Good quote. Although Franklin was right, there is a fundamental difference between his time and the present. People live far longer now, and are far less likely to take the slightest risk that may result in their dull lives being shortened.

the motorcycle isnt dangerous,

it can be kept in a garage for years and not hurt anyone.

put it in the wrong hands, and it will.


like a gun, doesnt matter if you got a small one, or a big one, given to the wrong person, they will do damage.

I don't think it will make a big difference to accident figures. As someone pointed out, most bikes/scooters are capable of 70 mph and out accelerating most cars. It is the person sitting on it who is dangerous and that comes down to a lack of training and attitude.

The DAS course (despite being short) actually gives you more hours of training than most people probably do in single hour lessons for learning to drive a car (for me anyway) I had a lot of respect for my instructors and listened to everything they said. I think initiatives like Bikesafe are a much better way of educating people and reducing casulties than restricting licences.

I'm sure a lot of you will agree with this; I think the biggest 2 wheeled hazard on the road is any scooter/ bike with L plates. One day of training (mainly off the road) and away they go.

At the end of the day you will always get the bimbo on the R1 (I would love to hear the whole story on that one!) and the chav on his scooter with no licence, and unfortunately these are the people everyone notices, not the 1000s of bikers who rarely put a wheel wrong.

Originally Posted by lynw

Soho is being disrupted by some antisocial individuals, the police are probably going to clamp down at the ace because of the bimbo on the R1. We as a group do not help ourselves or show that we can be trusted to ride sensibly and safely when the minority who are accident statistics waiting to happen is what the governments care about.

I think part of the problem is the way that bikers (probably because we're a minority) are lumped together, and what one does reflects badly on the whole lot of us. You get idiots in cars doing just as dangerous things, but because most people drive, they don't see those sort of people as anything to do with them, or other car drivers. Unfortunately, whilst we are quick to distance ourselves from uninsured/unlicenced chavs on scooters, people on supermotos wheelieing past schools and people on hyperbikes doing 180 on the motorway, most non-bikers cannot, or rather will not, make that distinction. They don't see the person as "a bad apple", they just see them as another biker.

It's hardly suprisingly really. Careful, considerate riders are barely registered (even if the cager sees them, there's no reason to make a mental note of their presence and they're soon past). People who wheelie past on the inside at a ton, with a full race can with the baffles out, understandably stick in their memories for longer.

I think it's total ********. They have acted on totally misused statistics. They say that bikes make up only 1% of the traffic on UK road yet make up 18% of casualties. What they don't then go onto explain is that nearly 70% of those motorcycle casualties were killed by other road users. So the answer to them is to remove bikes therefore remove the probelm even though bikes are not the problwm to begin with. Bloody ridiculous. It will have an impact as there will be less riders and then they will go on to claim that the scheme has worked but all those dangerous car/lorry drivers will still be out there. The only consolation is that these dangerous drviers will carry on killing each other ridding society of there incompetence. I'm all for making biking safer but the goverment are only out to persecute us as we are a minority. But then this is nothing new either. If it becomes too bad I think I will emigrate to a country where the government don't plan to screw you over at every turn.

Reminds me a bit of the similar row about the number of 16-19 y/o car drivers who are killing themselves rising while the number of licence holders in that age group has actually fallen...

Hang on, maybe there's a clue there somewhere