Crime and Policing Bill

Lord Shinkwin Excerpts

Committee stage
Wednesday 17th December 2025 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Lord Shinkwin]

346C: After Clause 106, insert the following new Clause—
“Dangerous, careless or inconsiderate cycling: review(1) Within one year of the day on which section 106 comes into force, the Secretary of State must publish a review assessing the effectiveness with which operators of bicycle courier services ensure that their employees and contractors conduct themselves on the roads in such a way as to avoid committing the offences in section 106.(2) The review under subsection (1) must recommend any changes to the law which may be necessary.”Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment seeks to probe how the law could be changed to ensure that companies who contract the services of delivery cyclists bear some responsibility for the conduct of these cyclists on the road.

[Lord Shinkwin (Con)]

My Lords, in speaking to Amendment 346C, I welcome the other amendments in this group in the names of my noble friends, Lord Blencathra and Lord McColl of Dulwich.

Amendment 346C is a modest and reasonable amendment, which would do exactly what it says on the tin. It would require the Home Secretary to institute

“a review assessing the effectiveness with which operators of bicycle courier services ensure that their employees and contractors conduct themselves on the roads in such a way as to avoid committing the offences in section 106”.

The review, which must be published within a year of that section coming into force, would recommend any changes to the law which the review determines may be necessary. The rationale for this amendment is similarly simple: it seeks to probe how the law could be changed to ensure that companies which contract for the services of delivery cyclists bear some responsibility for the conduct of those cyclists on the road.

Noble Lords will not be surprised to hear that I approach this issue from the perspective of a severely disabled person, whose condition makes me extremely vulnerable to the impact—and I use the term advisedly to mean the actual physical impact—of being hit by an individual riding one of these e-bikes in, to use the legislative terminology, a “dangerous, careless or inconsiderate” way. To put it bluntly, the impact would be catastrophic; I would not expect to survive. So I completely agree with my noble friend Lady Neville-Rolfe, who said on day six of Committee that you take your life in your hands when you cross some roads in central London. I do so, quite literally, every day, on my way to and from your Lordships’ House.

Now I entirely appreciate that whether I live or die is neither here nor there in the grand scheme of things. It would be a shame if I were killed, but the earth would continue to turn. I know that. Equally, I know that I am just one person. I think of all those people with visual impairments, for example, who literally risk life and limb just stepping outside their front door. So the review should consider the impact on them as well, and not just in terms of their independence, mental health and well-being, all of which will of course bring associated costs for the NHS and social care services, but of their employment prospects. For why would anyone want to risk going to work, given they could end up in hospital before they have even got to the office as a result of being hit by a courier cyclist on an e-bike while they were walking along the pavement or trying to board a bus from one of those so-called floating bus stops?

I cite this group as just one example—and of course there are people with mobility impairments like mine, or simply older people whose reflexes are not as sharp as they once were—to highlight how the dangers presented by dangerous, careless or inconsiderate cycling on e-bikes, particularly by courier and delivery cyclists, are having a far greater impact on our society than we perhaps realise. I would go so far as to say that the effect has been to airbrush out of the bigger social picture whole swathes of society. So while I am not suggesting that an assessment of impact should be disability-exclusive, I would argue that such an impact alone merits a review.

I say to the Minister that I am not laying the blame at the door of Government per se. The Member’s explanatory statement accompanying the amendment refers to the companies which contract the services of delivery cyclists bearing

“some responsibility for the conduct of these cyclists”—

the point being that the responsibility is shared. But none of us, either in Parliament or the Government, can deny that we also share responsibility for addressing the problem; in our case, by providing the most effective legislative framework to facilitate the change we all want to see—safer streets.

I am reminded of what the noble Lord, Lord Russell of Liverpool, said on day six in Committee, about us having made a “huge strategic mistake” by not factoring in the need for safety from the outset when these e-bikes were introduced. I agree with him. Sadly, some people, especially those in the Department for Transport, appear not to. They—and I dare say they are non-disabled and a bit slow on the uptake, bless them, so we need to make allowances—still do not seem to have woken up to the fact that this experiment has gone badly wrong.

That needs to be the starting point of the review. There must be a recognition—a fact which I sense the Minister implicitly acknowledges—that there is a significant and growing problem, which cannot simply be dismissed by officialdom’s obtuse obfuscation of, “Well, we are where we are”, because if we do not recognise that where we are is bad then we cannot move on.

Lime, the other e-bike hiring companies and companies such as Just Eat deserve to be in the dock and not in the saddle when it comes to this review. Yes, they will be part of the solution, but right now they are doing very nicely thank you very much from being a big part of the problem. They cannot be allowed to set or influence the review’s terms of reference or to sit on the review panel. That should be done by those most affected by dangerous, careless or inconsiderate cycling, not by those whose irresponsible indifference means they are profiting from putting people’s lives at risk.

In conclusion, I believe that the case for a review is compelling. As my noble friend Lady Stowell said on day six in Committee, courier delivery service e-bike users are “the worst perpetrators”. It is time we reviewed the situation. I beg to move.

[Lord Blencathra (Con)]

My Lords, my Amendment 416K supports a targeted, enforceable measure that holds delivery platforms to account where their operational model and oversight failures contribute to dangerous cycling on our streets. This is not about blame for individual riders alone; it is about closing a regulatory gap so that companies that profit from rapid, app-driven deliveries also carry responsibility for foreseeable harms linked to their business models and practices.

If noble Lords want a bit more excitement in their lives than the excitement of participating in this debate then I invite them to accompany me, when we rise tonight, to walk along Millbank, Horseferry Road and Marsham Street, past the Home Office. The excitement will come from them dodging out of the way of dozens of Deliveroo couriers belting along the pavements delivering to the thousands of flats in this area.

Even more excitement may come when I manage to confront one of these riders and we have an exchange of views, but not usually a meeting of minds. When I see them belting along the pavement, I drive straight for them. My chair is heavier than theirs, so they are the ones who are forced to dodge out of the way. When I manage to stop one on those massive, fat tyre, illegal bikes and speak to them, I can say with all honesty that every single one I have seen is a recent arrival to this country. Half do not speak English and do not know the law on riding killer bikes on the pavement. The other half do know and tell me to go away sexually, that they will do what they like, and who will stop them.

If I had said that a month ago, I might have been accused of racist comments, but on 4 December this year, the Home Office issued a press release to say that, in targeted action, it and the police had arrested 171 food delivery couriers for criminal activity, and 60 of them were illegal migrants facing deportation. The Home Office press release said:

“It comes as Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood has been targeting people working unlawfully in the ‘gig economy’. Border Security Minister Alex Norris has also met representatives from food-delivery firms to encourage them to do more to tackle the issue—such as using facial recognition checks to prevent riders sharing their identities with people who do not have permission to take up work in the UK. Norris said that November’s action ought to ‘send a clear message: if you are working illegally in this country, you will be arrested and removed’. He added: ‘We are tightening the law to clamp down on illegal working in the delivery sector to root out this criminality from our communities’”.


Good on you, Minister, and good on the Home Office—they have provided proof of what I have encountered every night for the past two years on the streets of Westminster, within hundreds of yards of this building. Good luck to you in trying to send them back to Eritrea, Somalia or wherever, because there is bound to be some immigration judge who will block you and cite bogus human rights reasons for why they cannot be deported. But that is your problem and not for today.

My amendment supplements what Minister Norris was doing. He exhorted the food delivery companies to do more to tackle the issue. My proposed new clause would give the police the power to penalise the food delivery companies financially, since money is the only thing that will make them change.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Shinkwin (Con)]

My Lords, I am very grateful to all noble Lords who have spoken. This has been a very useful debate that has brought the Committee together on an issue that has affected and is affecting so many of us.

The Minister was very kind in his remarks to me personally. Can I reciprocate by applauding the loyalty with which he stuck to the Department for Transport’s brief? It is entirely commendable, but I do feel that that script will not wash. He will sense from across the Committee that there is real alarm at the situation that confronts us in the immediate vicinity of Westminster and beyond.

I agree with my noble friend Lord Blencathra that all these amendments, and, of course, as I would say, my own, are proportionate and necessary because, as my noble friend made clear, this is a case of our laws being flagrantly abused and broken. My noble friend Lord McColl is absolutely right, as I made clear in my speech, that this is really affecting those who are most vulnerable in our society, particularly those who, like me, have a mobility impairment or those who have a visual impairment.

I thank the noble Lord, Lord Hogan-Howe, for his remarks, because, as he said, this does matter. A review could be an incremental step to, in effect, reclaiming our streets and making them far more safe. Employers are falsely claiming wilful ignorance, and we need to stand up to them.

I thank my noble friend Lord Goschen, and I agree with him. This Bill presents the Committee with a unique opportunity to do something about this situation; this is, as he said, our moment. I also agree with my noble friend Lady McIntosh of Pickering that it is nonsensical to allow crime to continue. I simply say to the Minister that I do not think his comment that the Bill will be subject to post-legislative review in three to five years quite reflects the urgency of the situation.

In closing, my condition means that I have to be a risk management expert, whether I like it or not. I have no choice. We have a choice here, and we need to act. I am very grateful to the Minister for saying that he is happy to meet in advance of Report. I believe that cycling is a very good thing. I use my manual chair for exercise—it is crucial for pain management—but cycling or using a manual chair also has wider health benefits. Equally, this sort of cycling, predominantly by delivery service couriers who frantically break every rule of the road to deliver a takeaway, is not good for pedestrians or cyclists. I look forward to bringing this back on Report. In the meantime, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 346C withdrawn.

Crime and Policing Bill

Lord Shinkwin Excerpts

Committee stage
Monday 15th December 2025 Lords Chamber

[Viscount Goschen (Con)]

Perhaps so. It is not a question of having ineffective enforcement; I would say that we have no enforcement whatever—at least none that I have ever seen. If you have a law that is not enforced at all and is defined by people ignoring it, you have a serious problem. We should not be making additional laws on the subject if we do not have a high degree of confidence that they will be enforced, or else we are wasting everybody’s time here.

I invite the Minister, in the context of all the amendments in this big group, to give us a broad overview of what the Government are going to do about enforcement. I know there are other amendments later also talking about enforcement, but unless he can convince us about that, I suggest that there is not much point to many of the provisions in this part of the Bill.

I note that the noble Lord, Lord Hogan-Howe, with whom I agree on many aspects of this and other Bills, knocks the ball into the Government’s court to come up with a registration scheme for cycles. This causes me some reflection. I think it would be extremely difficult to do and would be a very large step indeed, so my preference would be for more enforcement—in essence, people being stopped for those offences—rather than the amount of complication that such a scheme would generate. Children riding cycles on their way to school, for example, cannot have points because they do not have licences. I can imagine any number of unintended consequences. However, we need to do something, and if it is a licensing scheme for the heavier, faster e-bikes, maybe that is what has to happen, and I think the Government need to grasp that.

I was very taken with my noble friend Lord Blencathra’s Amendment 337E. Stating for the avoidance of doubt that if you cycle on a pavement, you are by definition cycling without due care and attention seems eminently sensible, just to make the law a bit clearer. Amendment 346B on e-bikes in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Hogan-Howe, is very important. I should declare an interest in that I have a mountain bike and an e-bike. I have two, as it happens, and I use them occasionally—not at the same time, I have to say; that would be too difficult.

People who want to move around London quickly have a choice. Either they buy a motorcycle and pass a complicated series of tests to get that motorcycle licence—if they go for the full licence; it is a lesser standard for smaller machines. They need to tax the vehicle; they need to insure it; and they need an MoT if it is of that age. Or they could ignore all that and get an illegal electric cycle with comparable performance to a moped, and no one seems to be stopping them, as far as I can see. They have no insurance, no tax, no registration and, happy days, no one is stopping them for any offences whatever.

There are, of course, proper electric motorbikes where you have to wear a helmet, have a registration and so forth—indeed, I think there are a few Peers who come to your Lordships’ House on such machines. We have a very broad spectrum, but at the moment a lot of people, particularly delivery drivers, are riding vehicles that are not being pedalled; they are just pushing an electric throttle, in essence. These are obviously illegal: even as an amateur, I can see that a policeman would have every right to stop them and impound that vehicle, so I think we have to make that clearer. I think by 15.5 miles an hour, we mean a maximum powered speed, because of course if you head downhill, you will go much faster, as with a conventional cycle. However, I think we have to say, for the avoidance of doubt, “That is a motorcycle”, if it does not meet the criteria, “and if you ride that without tax, registration, insurance and so forth, you are committing a series of significant offences, and you will be arrested and prosecuted for such”.

[Lord Shinkwin (Con)]

My Lords, I apologise to the Committee for not being in my seat when my noble friend Lord Blencathra began his remarks on Amendment 330. I am very grateful to the Government Whip for taking into account the rather pathetic speed with which I can get from the Library to the Chamber. I thank him for that.

At 429 pages in length, with 16 parts, 21 schedules and 159 pages of amendments, this Bill is truly a legislative Christmas tree. I am worried it is about to topple on the Minister, which would not be very festive. I will therefore keep my remarks disproportionately brief and save the bulk of them for my related amendment, Amendment 346C, which is due to be considered later in group 9.

However, I thank those noble Lords who tabled these important amendments on dangerous, careless and inconsiderate cycling. In my view, they are pure common sense. I would say that we are reinventing the wheel in ensuring public safety on our roads and pavements, but I am not sure we have progressed that far, such is the scale of the anarchy that currently plagues our streets. We have, as we have heard, so much to do to reverse it.

The worst thing is that the situation we find ourselves in is entirely self-inflicted, predictable and even logical. Our response needs to be equally as logical. That is why I support these amendments; they point a practical way forward in the struggle—and there is no denying this is a struggle—against the very real threat posed by dangerous, careless or inconsiderate cycling, especially to anyone with a mobility, visual or hearing impairment.

In conclusion, I welcome these amendments, and I look forward to the Minister’s reply.

[Baroness Stowell of Beeston (Con)]

My Lords, most of what I wanted to cover has already been spoken to, so I have very little to add. I did, however, want to pick up on a couple of points the noble Lord, Lord Russell, covered. For me, this is about disorder. There is a sense of unfairness for a lot of people that if you are a driver, you are subject to a huge number of restrictions—especially in London, with tighter-than-ever speed limits—and yet cyclists ride along in a way that seems to be flouting the laws of the road.

I will also pick up on something my noble friends Lady Neville-Rolfe and Lady McIntosh covered about the length of the trials that go on for e-scooters. I believe the same can be said for the seemingly never-ending approach to the consultation on pedicabs. We legislated for pedicabs to be subject to regulations 18 months ago, and it took us years to do that. TfL has done one consultation, has just completed another and it will be 2026 before regulations for pedicabs are in place. The length of time it takes for us to actually do anything which is seemingly common sense adds to people’s sense of frustration and disappointment that things that should not be happening are allowed to happen just because there is no simple enforcement.

The other thing I want to add is about delivery bikes. Often, they are the worst perpetrators of cycling on pavements, going through red lights and cycling at speed. We know they are doing this because there is a commercial imperative for them to act in that way.

Rather curiously, I was approached recently by one of the big digital delivery service businesses. It is concerned that the new provisions for additional protection against assault for retail workers do not apply to its delivery drivers. I am not advocating for what it is asking for, but, as I said to this particular company in reply to its email to me, my question to the company is: what is it doing as a business to make sure that its delivery drivers actually obey the law and do not drive in an anti-social way, on pavements, and so on?