Cheap PR stunt demonises cyclists 15/01/2009

CTC – the UK’s national cyclists’ organisation has completely refuted claims by car insurance company LV= that “inexperienced cyclists taking to the roads in the last 6 months have resulted in a 29% increase in road accidents involving cyclists”. The figure appears to be no more than the difference in casualty numbers for cyclists between summer and winter. LV=’s estimate of the number of collisions involving cyclists is over 9 times higher than official figures and is based on a serious miscalculation of the number of cyclists in Britain. CTC has dismissed the figure as nothing more than a scaremongering publicity stunt.

Roger Geffen, CTC’s Campaigns and Policy Manager, said: “This is Mickey Mouse research and flies in the face all official published statistics on cycling. There is plenty of evidence showing that cycling gets safer the more cyclists there are. In London there has been a 91% increase in cycle use on the capital’s main roads since 2000, and a 33% reduction in cycle casualties in roughly the same period”.

He added: “CTC has been researching cycle safety for over a century. Manipulating statistics for a PR stunt wastes the time of the people who took part in the survey. By demonising cyclists and scaring people into staying in their cars, it also undermines the efforts of charities like CTC to encourage more cycling and improve road safety for all”.

Singling out cyclists as a law-breaking group is discriminatory and serves only to create aggression and conflict between road users. This is highly irresponsible behaviour for an insurance company professing to care about road safety.

CTC has contacted LV= to set out our reasons why we think their figures are incorrect and have requested that they either revise them or withdraw their press release titled “Road users warned over inexperienced cyclists” dated 16.01.2009. A copy of that email is available on request and is summarised in the notes to editors.

Ends

For further information or to arrange an interview contact CTC’s Media and PR Officer Victoria Hazael on 0844 736 8453 or 07786320713

Notes to editors:

· The following analysis summarises the points made in CTC’s email to LV=:

· The press release issued by the car insurance company also highlighted how cyclists often break the law. CTC does not condone law-breaking and has in fact repeatedly called for more traffic police, given that illegal behaviour among drivers is far more likely to cause death or serious injury to both cyclists and others.

· In refuting the LV data, CTC takes issue with the claim that 43% of the adult population cycles. However, the latest data on cycle use from the Office for National Statistics’ General Household Survey (GHS) suggests that 9% of the adult population cycle at least once a week while 19% cycle at least once a year.

LV states there were 150,000 cycle accidents, when the official police-collected data show that there were 16,208 reported cycle casualties (most of them slight) in the 12 months July ’07 to June ’08. Far from the 29% increase in cycle collisions, these figures represent a 2% reduction in cycle casualties compared with the preceding 12 month period (16,585 casualties), and a 33% reduction compared with the 1994-98 average (24,023).

There are seasonal fluctuations in cycle casualties every year in the Department for Transport’s factsheet “Pedal cyclist casualties in road accidents: 2007”. The pattern varies from year to year (presumably due to variations in the weather), however there are typically around 175 casualties a month in the summer months April to October (rising in some months to over 200), whereas figures in winter are around 125 a month (and sometimes below 100). The 29% increase nothing more than the normal difference between the summer and the winter months.
CTC - the UK’s national cyclists' organisation, with 70,000 members and affiliates in 250 clubs across the UK, is the oldest and largest cycling body in the UK, established in 1878. We provide a comprehensive range of services, advice, events, and protection for our members and work to promote cycling by raising public and political awareness of its health, social and environmental benefits. For more information see www.ctc.org.uk.

Created by victoria.hazael@ctc.org.uk on 15/01/2009