It’s time for Labour to crack down on the scourge of e-scooters

As part of his six milestones, the prime minister should focus on this menace on our streets – and give the pavements back to pedestrians, writes Clive Morgan

Whenever I leave from my Midlands home in the morning, I know at least one of three things will or won’t happen: the sun won’t have yet struggled up, my London Northwestern “service” will be delayed, and my path to the station will be hindered by e-scooters.

These battery-powered personal transportation devices – deathtraps, for short – have somehow become an accepted annoyance of public life. Taking a child to the nearby primary school or walking to the station means stepping around the triagonal trip hazards.

It’s the same story around the revolving doors of my local hospital, where you’d hope riders would know better than to abandon the things, blocking entrances and impeding those with mobility issues.

Mine isn’t the only town in the UK that is littered with these contraptions. And increasingly there’s good reason why, in a game of word association (in my mind, at least) “e-scooter” automatically pairs with “menace”.

Earlier this month, a coroner in the East Midlands called for helmets to be made compulsory for e-scooter users after a father of four suffered a fatal head injury when he “lost control” of his ride.

According to the Department for Transport (DfT), there were six deaths last year involving e-scooters, and thousands more injuries. And that’s just accidents from collisions; in the nation’s hallways and bedrooms, blazes caused by battery fires are now one of the fire service’s most pressing new concerns.

As with so many things that have contributed to the enshittification of British life, the craze for e-scooters was started by the Johnson government. Four years ago, rental vehicles were permitted to be ridden on public roads for the first time, in two dozen towns. Many of those trials, designed to soften up the public for a more widespread lifting of a ban, are still ongoing.

Currently, the laws governing e-scooters and e-bikes remain notably vague but the upshot for pedestrians has been poor, with the number of collisions having trebled in three years. The rental trials have also prompted an inexorable rise in the use of illegal, unregulated e-scooters, many of which are “souped-up” to bypass the technology that limits travelling speeds to 15.5mph.

But e-scooters on sale legally can easily reach in excess of 60mph. The latest figures suggest there are more than a million privately owned vehicles in the UK.

I think it’s time to put a stop to the e-scooter experiment and call it an ignoble failure. The good news is that this administration seems keen on a crackdown, too. Before she became the first minister to resign from Keir Starmer’s cabinet, former transport secretary Louise Haigh announced that Labour would “look to legislate” around e-scooters, implementing stricter regulations and enforcement to ensure that they are used more responsibly.

Last week, e-scooter riders across southeast England were warned by police that they risk having their vehicles seized if they break bylaws. (And they really mean it this time…)

The move came after home secretary Yvette Cooper announced, as part of Labour’s manifesto pledge to crack down on antisocial behaviour, that police and local councils across the whole country would be given new powers to issue respect orders to reduce the “misery” caused to local people.

When Starmer announced during his most recent relaunch, the so-called “Plan for Change”, that he would govern by “measurable deliverables”, one of his six milestones was to tackle antisocial behaviour. I believe a clampdown on e-scooters could be the focal point for this.

“It’s time to restore respect,” he said. Where better to start than with making pavements for pedestrians again?

Don’t get me wrong, I am not completely against e-scooters – they are a symbol of modern convenience and have the potential to revolutionise urban transportation. But I am anti their misuse.

By laser-focusing its antisocial efforts on e-scooters – implementing stricter penalties for reckless riding and improper parking, which would serve as a deterrent and encourage further responsible behaviour – the government could show voters it was fulfilling one of its stated priorities.

Which would make a change. And it might also help us reclaim the streets.