Review of mobility scooter laws long overdue

MOBILITY scooters on the nation’s pavements are relatively new arrivals, burgeoning in popularity, particularly in seaside resorts and other towns with many retirees.

Not that everybody qualifies to own and drive one. You have to be over 14 and “have trouble (but not too much trouble) walking, because of an injury, physical disability, or medical condition”.

Finance might be a problem. Basic models start at £450 new, £3,200 for sturdier threewheelers, up to £6,600 for top-ofthe-range models. Unlimited second-hand scooters cost even less. Additional funding is available via Motability or the NHS.

Surprisingly, you need no number plates nor third-party insurance. Speed is automatically limited to 4mph for Class 2 (travel on pavements only) or 8mph for Class 3 (use pavements and roads). Whatever one’s navigational skills, there is no scooter driving test.

Scooters are new to the urban landscape because it was always accepted “invalids” would be pushed by their carers, usually in a chair made of wicker, later steel, or resort to steered or self-controlled “invalid carriages”.

Much sought-after independence for the favoured few came in the purpose-built disability tricycles and “Invacars” popular in Britain’s street-scene in the 1960s, 70s and 80s, which have fallen out of favour once Vespa and Lambretta scooter technology from 1955 onwards, made the startlingly modern - and less stigmatized - mobility scooter more available and more versatile.

That leaves one paramount concern for all pedestrians and shoppers without a harsh disability or infirmity: safety. Mobility scooters present a definitely unseen, startlingly unheard, hazard to unsuspecting people.

If mobility scooters carry a horn, a hooter, a bell or an alarm, I have never received that forewarning. Equally if any scooter owner has ever shouted a warning, I have never been alerted by it. Instead these fast and heavy vehicles creep up on me unawares.

No way can I know a scooter is immediately behind me. Nor can a driver know if I’m about to turn left or right or enter a shop doorway.

New laws, including mandatory insurance and speed reduction, are long overdue.

Godfrey Holmes, Withernsea.