Cyclists kill or maim two pedestrians every week

CYCLISTS kill or seriously injure two pedestrians every week, official figures show.

Over the past seven years, 25 pedestrians have died in collisions with bikes and 700 were seriously injured.

The toll last year was three killed and 112 injured, the figures from the Department for Transport show. This represents a 16 per cent increase on the figure four years earlier.

The data comes after the widower of Kim Briggs, 44, who died after being knocked down by cyclist Charlie Alliston, 20, called for new laws to protect pedestrians from cyclists. Alliston was cleared of manslaughter but got 18 months in a young offend- ers’ institute for causing injury by ‘wanton or furious driving’ – a Victorian law designed for horses and carriages – after mowing down Mrs Briggs as she crossed a road in east London.

Her husband Matthew said the case demonstrated the ‘gap in the law when it comes to dealing with death or serious injury by dangerous cycling’.

After Alliston’s sentencing, transport minister Jesse Norman announced an urgent review of laws.

The Department for Transport said its review would include ‘looking at the case for a new offence, equivalent to causing death or serious injury by careless or dangerous driving, that will help protect both cyclists and pedestrians’.

‘A gap in the law’