Crime and Policing Bill

Lord Berkeley Excerpts

Committee stage
Monday 15th December 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Hanson of Flint (Lab)]

There are operational issues. We put the money into Operation Topaz for all police forces to examine them, and ultimately it is for the forces to determine. The City of London Police has determined who is a problem in the City of London. There is a strong argument for parts of the country to face further enforcement measures because self-evidently there are problems. There will be public consultation before any new regulations come into force. It is a Department for Transport matter, so I hope that the noble Baroness will allow me to reflect on that with regard to when the consultation is. I will get back to her as a matter of course.

The noble Baroness’s Amendment 344 seeks to require reporting annually on cycling offences. We already publish annual statistics on those killed and seriously injured—in fact, a number of noble Lords and Ladies have quoted those in the debate today. Therefore, I suggest that this is already covered.

Amendment 346, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Davies, seeks to make it an offence to tamper with an e-bike. I accept that some people may well tamper with or modify their e-bikes to increase their speed, but as I already mentioned, this is already an offence under Section 143 of the Road Traffic Act 1988. Should the police issue a fixed penalty notice, this would result in a £300 fine and six penalty points, and should the case go to court, it could result in an unlimited fine and driving disqualification.

I have tried to cover a number of points; I apologise for not referring individually to every point made by every noble Lord. The broad thrust is that there is a problem—we recognise that. There should be enforcement—we are trying to address that. There is a new measure in the Bill, Clause 106, to increase the level of penalty for causing death and serious injury by dangerous cycling. We recognise that and I welcome the support of the House. A range of discussion points and measures have been brought forward today around lifting, increasing or changing the penalties accordingly. We may well revisit those on Report, but the Government are right in recognising the problem, putting some money into enforcement and making dangerous cycling and causing death by cycling further offences with serious consequences.

I therefore invite the noble Lord to withdraw and not to press his amendments on behalf of the noble Lord, Lord Lucas.

[Lord Berkeley (Lab)]

I am sorry that I could not be here at the beginning of this group. My noble friend has given a very encouraging response to the many amendments—

[Lord in waiting/Government Whip (Lord Katz) (Lab)]

My Lords, the Minister has gone over time, but in any case the noble Lord needed to be here at the start of the group to be able to intervene during the debate.

Crime and Policing Bill

Lord Berkeley Excerpts

Committee stage
Monday 15th December 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Berkeley (Lab)]

My Lords, I was very interested in the list of different types of wheeled movement produced by the noble Baroness, Lady Mcintosh of Pickering. It is easy to go into great detail—she mentioned monocycles. You could have further definitions depending on the diameter of the wheel, the pressure in the tyre and any other kind of thing. But where will it get us apart from more fines and a lack of enforcement? As my noble friend said in the last group of amendments, he is doing his very best with enforcement, particularly in the City of London. There is a limit to how much enforcement you can get.

You could then have a category for different-sized boxes on the back of these things. The noble Baroness, Lady Pidgeon, has got it right—we should just keep it simple; make it proportionate to the damage and effect that cycling and scootering have on other people, and leave it like that.

[Lord Davies of Gower (Con)]

My Lords, I thank my noble friend Lady McIntosh of Pickering for her clause stand part notice. On behalf of the Opposition Front Bench, we support Clause 106. As was set out in response to one of the earlier groups on cycling, we on this side strongly support the creation of the new offences of causing death or serious injury by dangerous cycling.

It is often said, and too rarely challenged, that cyclists are harmless; that their contribution to road danger is negligible. But the facts tell another story. As was said earlier, there were 82 pedal cycle fatalities in 2024 and many more serious injuries. Yet in the same period, the number of prosecutions for careless or dangerous cycling remained vanishingly small. In 2023, only 44 pedal cyclists were convicted for careless cycling and only five convicted for dangerous cycling. That discrepancy between actual harms and enforcement cannot stand.

Contrast that with motor vehicle driving—serious collisions involving cars or motorbikes routinely lead to formal investigations, charges, licence points, disqualifications and even long prison terms. The law, and indeed the public, treat death or serious injury caused by a motor vehicle as a major crime, but there is no comparable public or legal response when a cyclist injures or kills a pedestrian. That double standard undermines justice and safety and sends the wrong message.

Furthermore, with the rise of e-bikes and e-scooters, a dangerous tool is emerging that should not go unaddressed. As noted in the impact assessment for the Bill, prosecutions for existing offences are minimal and the penalties are insufficiently dissuasive. That suggests not only a failure to protect law-abiding cyclists and citizens but a broader pattern of underpolicing of cycle-related crime.

If we are serious about public safety and fair and equal enforcement, we cannot continue to treat dangerous cycling as a lesser category of offence. For that reason, I support Clause 106.

[Lord Berkeley (Lab)]

The noble Lord did not mention cars running over pedestrians and killing them—does that not matter?

[Lord Davies of Gower (Con)]

Of course it matters. It is quite a serious matter, in my opinion.

--- Later in debate ---

I strongly support Amendment 416C in the name of my noble friend Lord Bailey of Paddington, and I look forward to hearing him speak to it. I also support the alcolock amendment from the noble Lord, Lord Hampton. That device has an interesting side-effect in that people who have an alcohol problem have to completely avoid drinking alcohol, because they cannot go about their daily business. That has the effect that they will not drink and drive, so although I opposed it years ago when it was part of a Bill, I am now minded to support it. Interestingly enough, when we were debating it I used my technical experience to detect a loophole in the legislation, because it did not quite work. When I suggested an amendment, the Government lapped it up.

[Lord Berkeley (Lab)]

I thought that the noble Lord was going to tell us about the experience of driving tanks—I know he is a great expert on that—with or without the right alcohol limit, but he did not.

I have listened very carefully to all the speeches on this group of amendments. They seem to have one thing in common, which is that it is a way of trying to mitigate the previous scaredom, if you like, of previous Governments to upsetting the motorists: “Let’s do the minimum, because we don’t want to upset the motorists”. That applies to the random breath tests and many other things.

My noble friend Lady Hayter listed the various countries with the different blood alcohol limits. If you dig a bit further, you find that there are four European countries that have a zero-tolerance level, where you must not have any alcohol at all. They are the Czech Republic, Hungary, Romania and Slovakia. Many of us have visited these places; maybe their driving is safer and maybe it is not. Then there is of course the question of bikes. Should you be under the influence of 80 milligrams or 50 milligrams if you are riding a bike? I will not go into that one now; we have talked a lot about bikes today. However, many noble Lords have been fighting to get it down from 80 milligrams to 50 milligrams for many years, led by my noble friend Lady Hayter and the noble Earl, Lord Attlee, and I have tried to help. We have all failed because it appears that Governments of whichever hue—the Labour Party, the Tories, or whatever—have been so frightened of the motorists’ reaction that they have refused to go forward with it.

The evidence is uncontroversial now, and we should go for this. I favour a 50- milligram limit to start with, but—it is a big but after our discussions today—with much better enforcement and much better reduction in the number of different rules that have to be applied before anybody can be tested with a breathalyser. It has to be simple and, if people will be frightened by it, that, combined with a lower limit, will hopefully make the roads a great deal safer.

[Lord Ashcombe (Con)]

My Lords, I speak to Amendment 416B, tabled in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter of Kentish Town, which concerns the issue of uninsured drivers and to which I have added my name, as this is a serious crime. I declare my interest as an insurance broker with Marsh Ltd.

Within the motor industry, it is a regrettable truth that a significant number of vehicles on our roads are being driven without insurance. The Motor Insurers’ Bureau estimates that between 300,000 and 450,000 vehicles fall into this category. That figure alone should give us pause for thought. It represents not merely statistics but a vast unknown risk to every law-abiding citizen. When accidents occur involving these vehicles, there is no third-party insurance to provide protection or compensation. Instead, the burden falls upon the Motor Insurers’ Bureau, which must step in to provide cover where none exists. Sadly, we read of such occurrences all too often, particularly in the local press.

The scale of this problem is stark. The bureau receives a claim arising from an uninsured driver every 20 minutes. Every week, at least one person is killed as a result of uninsured driving and, every single day, another individual suffers injuries so severe that they require lifelong care. This is not a marginal issue but a persistent and devastating reality.

The financial consequences are equally sobering. The bureau spends approximately £400 million annually on claims, with its 2024 annual report noting reserves of around £3 billion. It estimates that uninsured driving costs the UK economy £1 billion each year and adds £260 million to motor insurance premiums. These figures are not abstract. They translate to an additional cost of around £15 on every policy paid by law-abiding drivers. In effect, responsible motorists are subsidising the reckless and the negligent. Anecdotally, when police apprehend uninsured drivers and ask who is their insurer, the response is simply, “The MIB”—the Motor Insurers’ Bureau. This casual reliance on the bureau underscores the inadequacy of current deterrence.

At present, as the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter, has explained, the penalties stand at £100 for keeping an uninsured vehicle and £300 plus six penalty points for driving without insurance. These sums are significantly lower than the average premium of £550 and far below the £1,000 often paid by younger drivers. This disparity is glaring. The penalty for breaking the law is cheaper than the cost of compliance. It is little wonder, then, that uninsured drivers persist at such scale. Ideally, we would strengthen the financial penalties to reflect the gravity of the offence. However, as these measures have been ruled out of scope, as the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter, mentioned, this amendment offers a practical and proportionate alternative. It would empower authorities to confiscate uninsured vehicles and, if insurance is not secured within 28 days, to have them permanently removed from the road. That, to you and I, means crushed—gone. This is not punitive for its own sake: it is a necessary step to protect the public and to uphold the principle that motor insurance is mandatory for the benefit of us all.

Uninsured driving is not a victimless crime. The law-abiding majority should not be asked to carry the burden of those who flout their responsibilities. Amendment 416B is a measured and effective response to this scourge and I commend it.