On Saturday 29 January the Government will introduce new rules to the Highway Code. The changes should make our roads safer for everyone, but they won’t be effective unless all road users are made aware of them. That’s where you come in.
Thousands of people backed our campaigning for these changes in 2020 but now we need your help once again, to take them from the rule book to the road. Please follow and engage with our messaging on social media – you can find Cycling UK on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
‘We need politicians and experts’: how Chile is putting the climate crisis first | Chile | The Guardian
‘We need politicians and experts’: how Chile is putting the climate crisis first
President Gabriel Boric has brought renowned named climate scientist Maisa Rojas into government to help ensure a greener future
John Bartlett
On 11 March, Gabriel Boric, 35, a tattooed leftist with a steely resolve to reform Chile from the bottom up, will become the country’s youngest ever president – and his green agenda is echoing across the world as time ticks away on an impending climate catastrophe.
Transport emissions are biggest threat to UK net zero targets as government pursues ‘absurd’ £27bn road building programme | The Independent
‘Absurd’ road schemes are biggest threat to net zero, campaigners warn
Harry Cockburn 3 days ago
Transport emissions are biggest threat to UK net zero as figures show huge drop in lockdown
Campaigners say £27bn on new roads threatens progress after sharp fall in emissions in lockdown
Lifetime Cost Of Small Car $689,000; Society Subsidises This Ownership With $275,000 – forbes
Carlton Reid 24/2/22
Cars can be convenient, but they are also incredibly costly, both to owners and society in general. New academic research has calculated that the lifetime cost of a small car—such as an Opel Corsa—is about $689,000, of which society pays $275,000. (A Mercedes GLC costs $1+m over an owner’s lifetime.)
‘No viable alternative’: UK must introduce road pricing, MPs say – theguardian.com
Gwyn Topham
Motorists will have to pay by the mile to make up a £35bn tax shortfall that will arise from the shift to electric vehicles, MPs have warned, calling on the government to act urgently to bring in a national road pricing scheme.
The cross-party Commons transport select committee said it saw “no viable alternative” to road pricing and work should start immediately on creating a replacement for fuel duty before it dwindled away with the transition.
Without urgent reform of motoring taxation, the UK would face an under-resourced and congested future, the committee said. New petrol and diesel vehicles will be banned from sale from 2030, as part of the governments 2050 net zero plans, losing the Treasury roughly £28bn in fuel duty and £7bn in vehicle excise duty, under current tax rules.
A new Tory faction is ‘scrutinising’ net zero – with tactics learned from Brexit | Eleanor Salter | The Guardian
Eleanor Salter
In the final days of Theresa May’s premiership, the UK’s net-zero target, like the landmark 2008 Climate Change Act before it, entered the statute book with hardly any resistance.
Well-founded complaints were made that it did not match the pace and scale required to address climate breakdown, but, as in 2008, across parliament there appeared to be an underlying consensus that “something had to be done”. Outright climate-change denial was kept to a faint background hum.
Has the Times declared war on cyclists? | Peter Walker | The Guardian
Peter Walker
Even in the context of the UK media’s famously curious coverage of everyday cycling, this was a surprise. Away from the more familiar tabloid cries of a “battle” over changes to the Highway Code, tucked away in the sober enclave of the Times’s editorial pages something odd was happening.
It was near the bottom of a leader column on cycling that a paper which, less than a decade ago, launched the most concerted and effective media campaign for safe cycling seen in this country for years, decided in effect to declare war on those who opt for two-wheeled transport.
Antarctica’s ‘Doomsday Glacier’ keeps scientists at bay with iceberg and sea ice | Antarctica | The Guardian
Antarctica’s so-called Doomsday Glacier, nicknamed because it is huge and coming apart, is thwarting an international effort to figure out how dangerously vulnerable it is.
A large iceberg has broken off the deteriorating Thwaites glacier and, along with sea ice, it is blocking two research ships with dozens of scientists from examining how fast its crucial ice shelf is falling apart.
“Many drivers believe: might is right.” Lords Debate the Highway Code Amendments
Sean Meager 28 January, 2022
It’s unlikely to come as much surprise to readers of this publication that there have been updates to the UK’s Highway Code.
Yesterday (27 January) I (Sean Meager), tuned in to witness Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (Jenny Jones), raise a ‘motion of regret’ in the House of Lords to trigger a debate among our Noble Lords. In attendance was Baroness Vere of Norbiton, Parliamentary Under-Secretary in the Department for Transport and lead minister for roads, poised to set out the Government’s position. Jones is an ardent advocate for safer active travel and CI.N has a separate interview with her here.
“What drives you mad about cyclists?” Radio 4 presenter criticised for “irresponsible” questions during Highway Code segment | road.cc
“What drives you mad about cyclists?” Radio 4 presenter criticised for “irresponsible” questions during Highway Code segment
One Twitter user claimed the interview “encouraged aggressive driving towards cyclists”
A BBC Radio 4 presenter has been criticised for asking what some have described as “irresponsible” and “poorly judged” questions about cyclists during a segment on the recent revisions to the Highway Code.
On Saturday’s edition of the Today programme, the long-running news and current affairs show, Mishal Husain interviewed Kevin Fong, a doctor and television presenter, and racing driver and motoring journalist Rebecca Jackson
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