Yesterday in Parliament, Judith brought forward a bill to tackle nuisance quads.
Speaking on the Bill, Judith said:
“Anti-social quads are a growing problem in our towns and cities. They create a massive noise nuisance, and their reckless, dangerous and illegal use is a threat to other road users and pedestrians.
Over a thousand quads are stolen from farms every year, and many of those make their way onto our streets. Off-road quads are not road legal precisely because they are not safe for use on our public highways.
The police work hard to deal with problem quads, but once seized, there’s no guarantee that they won’t end up back on the roads plaguing the very same neighbourhoods time and time again.
This is a cycle that must be broken.
The seize and release approach is not working, police must be given the power to seize and destroy nuisance quads, taking them off the street permanently.
My bill will propose giving police the powers they need to dispose of these quads once seized so they can never be used illegally on our streets again.
I am also calling for consistency in the law for wearing helmets – we must make helmets a legal requirement for quad users on public roads, just as they are for motorbikes and mopeds. The evidence is clear that helmets help prevent serious injury. Legislation needs to catch up with the reality of the growing number of quads on our roads.
Finally, I want immobilisers to be mandatory on quads. This adds another layer of protection for legitimate owners like farmers and deters thefts, reducing the number of stolen vehicles getting onto the roads in the first place.
We need to stop seeing these vehicles as toys. They can cost as much as a car and are powerful for their small size. If we continue to let this type of vehicle slip through the cracks in current legislation, we fail to protect legitimate owners from needless theft, we fail to protect residents dealing with chronic noise, and we fail to protect all road users and pedestrians who remain at risk.”
https://twitter.com/JudithCummins/status/1503769885679177730
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