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Welcome to Drivers' Union East Midlands.
Our Mission: Better road safety at lower cost. No unnecessary delay or slowing of road transport. No unnecessary or unjust prosecution of safe drivers.

Motorists & Drivers' Union is at www.driversunion.co


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Showing posts with label horses. Show all posts
Showing posts with label horses. Show all posts

Wednesday, 24 August 2016

Tweeting exposes today's anti driver single issue lobby police.

There can be no better insight into police policy and thinking than when they expose themselves in un edited, uncontrolled Tweeting at all levels.

 Because we now have a police service dominated by the UK Metropolitan Elite, See who is running the police. all police are now encouraged to communicate and be available to all media on a one to one basis, so that we now have police TV stars from all forces and police competing in their own top police Twitter awards. 

 Now it may seem right to this new breed of management to market the police as if it is some sort of business and speak to the people at their level on their medium but it isn't. 

 The police isn't a 'ya right on' popularity contest to be marketed like a business; it's there to do a nasty job. 'A policeman's lot is not a happy one' wasn't written as some figment of someone's imagination. 

 As a result of this new unrepresentative police leadership, we now have police more interested in supporting illogical single issue lobby groups and minorities than the community as a whole. 

 Not only is all this uncontrolled Tweety, Nicy, Selfy, silly piccie policing costing us all from the police budget and is certainly not policing but it exposes officers at all levels, not only revealing their mindset, but how silly they can be. That's why in The Real Police, see before all this happened, everything a commander published had been carefully vetted and considered and no-one else could say or write anything public without permission. 

 It's from such Tweets that I found out about this minority single issue lobby group within the police that we are paying for. How can police claim they're hard up, then maintain divisive single issue police groups like LGBT? This is your modern happy clappy policing under the NPCC Basically, as I have published, see this is no country for Stale, Pale, Male and his wife

 The modern police, under the current NPCC, are just a microcosm of how the UK is now run. Unfortunately, hidden behind most ideology is dishonesty too. It's really not about Left Wings and Right Wings, - that's just as contrived as other controlling myths such as 'Speed Kills' 'Living Streets' 'Sharing' 'It's 30 for a reason' - no there is only right and wrong about any issue. 


All  Left people have one thing in common, they are all still stuck in naive adolescence where unfortunately, no matter what their academic title, Doctor, or Professor, they are stuck in their unreal immature world but to reconcile their nonsense, they must lie and cheat and at some point label their critics with name calling and marginalisation. 

 Nowhere is this phenomenon more apparent than in policing and road safety issues. Against genuine and relevant road safety is the green anti driver ideologists, over promoted with public funding in far too many bogus charities and the mercenary profiteers feeding from them. See the vested interests here.  

 But the worst of all is the  costly Traffic Policing Empire who are not only dishonest but actually operate against community interests.

 No better example of police marketing themselves locally than working with local Nimby Speed Watch vigilantes, See more here  and see how police twist complaints of dangerous drivers to justify it here.

 What the following tweets reveal is that police are more interested in impeding major roads infrastructure, against the needs of the community, than supporting road safety, The Community and drivers. They actively promote unneeded human and animal hazards in the road for pure recreation (Here in rural Lincolnshire, the only cyclists we see are out on a jolly) than genuine road safety. They also think that Tractors and agriculture are the only essential motorised road users who must be considered. Roads are not about a 'Pace of life'; all motor transport on the roads is there for essential reasons. 

 What this series of tweets confirms is that we do have an anti driver anti genuine road safety Traffic Police Empire. 

 Here you will see one high volume Tweeter, a costly Traffic Chief Inspector, revealing that one of his ambitions is to win a police tweeting award. Can you believe what traffic policing has come to? 

 See Here's why we must disband the massive, self promoting, traffic police empire.  


So tractor drivers ignoring large tailbacks causing overtake dangers isn't driving without due care then?  Roads are not about a pace of life but about people trying to get things done..

At no time can traffic police tell us why we must have exposed people in the road. It's not like kiddies 'sharing', sweeties, cakes and footballs. See: Roads are major infrastructure not playgrounds. 


This tweet from the same Traffic Chief connects him to support of another divisive single issue police lobby group.

A classic example of not only police supporting unneeded hazards against drivers and road safety, but joining in the fun themselves. 
Horse riding on roads is now pure recreation and contrary to safety. Why do police promote it?




If the horse is nervous in traffic, why force it to be on the road? Wouldn't that be better advice from the Northants Police? 
Oh dear. This is what happens with uncontrolled police tweeting. 


See how we have been running Britain on the basis that all policy must be nice. 

 Look all we want is police being police instead of tweeting and telling us how nice they are. Policing was never about being nice.  
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Friday, 29 April 2016

Drivers must learn from these two trials.

Two cases have just ended in the courts involving cyclists and drivers. 


 In this one,  driver-jailed-for-eight-months-after-colliding-with-cyclist-riding-three-abreast-1-7355645  The driver was gaoled. 

 In this one,  Driver_involved_in_fatal_crash_with_cyclist_tells_court_the_rider_was_on_the_wrong_side_of_the_road/  

 In both cases, cyclists were in the wrong position on the road.

 In one case, the cyclist came round a left hand bend, fast, with other cyclists in a timed event. Because he was fast, and not well over to the left, he collided with a car coming up the hill, that had ironically just safely overtaken yet another cyclist, pumping up the hill; no doubt giving the kind of exaggerated passing distance demanded by the cycle lobby. Even if he were still in the middle of the road, this whole event was still caused by unnecessary human activity in the road; as indeed was the other case too. 

 Will any lessons be learned from this?

 So in the first case, has this encouraged cyclists to ignore safety, ignore other road users and still ride three abreast? In other words, how will this case stop it happening again? What's wrong with cyclists riding single file and keeping to the left if they insist on mingling with crucial infrastructure in the first place? 

 In the second case, why are we using crucial infrastructure for some kind of dangerous timed activity? Roads, like railway lines and airport runways, are essential infrastructure. Let's keep cycling competition off the open roads.

 But the most important lesson? In the first case, in many ways the most compelling, the driver pleaded not guilty and was acquitted. 

 In the second case the driver pleaded guilty and is now in gaol.

 Drivers: Never plead guilty to any offence involving cyclists who are behaving in such a road dominating fashion. They have a duty of care for their own safety. 

 I believe that while society allows any unneeded dangerous activity in our roads, like unprotected humans, travelling at unnatural speed and being exposed to big essential machinery, which cannot possibly be safe, then how can anyone be blamed when it goes badly wrong?

 Perhaps more defence lawyers should be raising this for their clients instead of just taking their easiest option. Drivers ensure your lawyer isn't a keen cyclist too. 

 But I am sure that lawyers would agree that, if arrested at one of these horrific accidents, drivers should never make any comment about it or replies to the police at that time and without a lawyer present.




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Saturday, 6 December 2014

Life after Beeching. So what replaced trains as main transport infrastructure?

After Beeching cut railways to the core, we failed to provide the exclusive priority enjoyed by trains and railways to the obvious alternative; road transport. How can we then hamstring such substitute strategic infrastructure with unnecessary hazards, liability and ideologically and environmentally based speed restrictions and prosecution? 


Richard Beeching, Baron Beeching (21 April 1913 – 23 March 1985), commonly known as Dr Beeching, was chairman of British Railways and a physicist and engineer. He became a household name in Britain in the early 1960s for his report "The Reshaping of British Railways", commonly referred to as "The Beeching Report", which led to far-reaching changes in the railway network, popularly known as the Beeching Axe.
As a result of the report, just over 4,000 route miles were cut on cost and efficiency grounds, leaving Britain with 13,721 miles (22,082 km) of railway lines in 1966. A further 2,000 miles (3,200 km) were lost by the end of the 1960s.[
On 27 March 1963, Beeching published his report on the future of the railways. Entitled "The Reshaping of British Railways", he called for the closure of one-third of the country's 7,000 railway stations. Passenger services would be withdrawn from around 5,000 route miles accounting for an annual train mileage of 68 million and yielding, according to Beeching, a net saving of £18m per year. The reshaping would also involve the shedding of around 70,000 British Railways jobs over three years. Beeching forecast that his changes would result in an improvement in British Railway's accounts of between £115m and £147m.[7] The cut-backs would include the scrapping of a third of a million goods wagons, much as Stedeford had foreseen and fought against. See Gourvish (link below)
Unsurprisingly, Beeching's plans were hugely controversial not only with trade unions, but with the Labour opposition and railway-using public. Beeching was undeterred and argued that too many lines were running at a loss, and that his charge to shape a profitable railway made cuts a logical starting point.[4] As one author puts it, Beeching "was expected to produce quick solutions to problems that were deep-seated and not susceptible to purely intellectual analysis."[8] For his part, Beeching was unrepentant about his role in the closures: "I suppose I'll always be looked upon as the axe man, but it was surgery, not mad chopping."[9]
Beeching was nevertheless instrumental in modernising many aspects of the railway network, particularly a greater emphasis on block trains which did not require expensive and time-consuming shunting en route.
On 23 December 1964, Tom Fraser informed the House of Commons that Beeching was to return to ICI in June 1965.[10]

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Saturday, 1 March 2014

Is your association interested in road safety truth or an imaginary dog?

This is being sent in one form or another to certain media, politicians and organisations that should know better and are not supporting drivers.

For many years now I have given much of my time and money voluntarily to seek for more genuine non profit and no ideologically based road safety policy.

I know that profit and ideology will never produce good road safety. On that basis we are being led to focus more on what doesn't cause accidents because of the money or green anti driver ideology, and miss real genuine causes of accidents. In fact I have identified the worst kind, of multi casualty accidents, as certainly one we could do much better with, as well as urban night time accidents; particularly involving the most vulnerable like walkers, cyclists and motor cyclists which I firmly believe are being ignored because, coincidentally, there is no profit from addressing them. 

I have realised that if our road safety is not profit based, - why should we be fooled by the piety expressed by those profiting or doing very nicely from it? – then this will also be fairer to drivers too.

I am not an apologist of idiot and reckless irresponsible drivers but I am opposed to the wholesale prosecution, profit based, of many thousands of perfectly safe drivers and the coercion on them to accept guilt by virtue of offers of lower penalty and worse, paying money to private companies for their services; the legality of which is now in question.

My CV and of my supporting colleagues in this makes me at least equal to any top police expert in the subject with the advantage of no vested interest or monetary influence to avoid the truth and the reality.

My aims are quite simple. To achieve the very best, not for profit, road safety. To stop all unnecessary prosecution of perfectly safe drivers and particularly any profiteering from that.

My slogan is: ‘Profit and ideology will never provide best road safety’

I am sure that if you are dispassionate, as a political party should be, you will not be able to fault any of the foregoing. The only people who do are, as you would expect, the profiteers and anti driver ideologists; believe me it is possible to be an anti driver driver as it is an anti people person.  You may even be one at heart but that should never affect your policy.

It seems to me that for some reason xxxxxx are unwilling to take advantage of  my work even though there is no open and overt official challenge to any of the facts and connections I have made; particularly my work on speed, why speeding occurs, and what causes accidents. Why should xxxxx avoid these things? County councillors are now starting to listen. I have addressed two separate committees in the last month.

One reason is that undoubtedly I am focusing on the profiteers and vested interests of road safety and challenging their propaganda. I am upsetting very powerful people. That should not worry a free Press in such a life and death issue with the added dimension of life changing prosecutions should it?

Another reason is the old chestnut of being too vocal, too outspoken. But this fraud road safety is all being achieved and built on the supine nature of UK’s drivers. The Alliance of British Drivers, which agrees with all of my research and conclusions has existed for some twenty years and in that time, driver oppression, taxation, penalties, and anti driver road policy, have got worse not better.  So clearly conciliation instead of direct open challenge is not an answer when dealing with profiteers and ideologists.

I am 73, and people are dying out there now. Hundreds of thousands of drivers are wrongly being over slowed, hampered and prosecuted and without any question, most of the prosecution can be shown and proved to be for income purposes alone. When, in every other aspect of sentencing and punishment which has been decreased generally, for drivers, not only have sentences been increased, including jail, but new reasons to jail drivers have been added. To achieve this, the word ‘accident’ has even been taken from the official vocabulary too. I do not see any of this as a popularity contest and time is not on my side. If the ABD are an example of a driver’s group that the officials and vested interests love, being nice has clearly failed road safety and the UK drivers so far.

So yes I do upset lots of people, but not most drivers. There are thirty five million of them and all sixty million of us cannot do without them, including you. So as a driver, what is not to like about what I do?

As a cyclist or a green ideologist there is much to despise about what I do, and indeed I do receive lots of bile, venom, personal abuse from those quarters. There are at least three parody twitter accounts just for that purpose and it worries me that you are following one of them. Let me remind you that, those groups are, by definition and by their dishonest nature, against the very aims that you so recently couldn't fault with above. Genuine non profiteering road safety and no unnecessary prosecutions of thousands of safe people with a profit motive too.

To address the green issues I have had to voluntarily read much environmental and climate science, and then adding what I read to what we all know and understand and would expect, in a nutshell ‘It’s The Sun wot duz it silly’ as any Joe Bloggs would expect and needs no consensus to tell him. ‘The Emperor has no clothes on’ So no I don’t believe in man made climate change, I know that CO2 is a life giving element and the Planet was much lusher and greener and vibrant when it was 4 times higher than it is now but in any case all of UK’s motor transport only produces 0.7% of all man made CO2. anyway. So yes I am hated by The Green Lobby. Are journalists entitled to allow a partisan stance affect their work though? An embargo on what makes them angry? Yes there are the George Monbiots but local press?

I have, as part of my work, had to address road cycling because as a very vocal minority, the cycling lobbyists have simply been bringing great attention to themselves recently. They have been making all sorts of demands ranging from more space- which means even less for drivers or if not, dedicated space at a cost of billions to us all- to more sentencing and longer jail terms for drivers and so on.

Cyclists have their own powerful ideological cross party parliamentary group. There was a recent Commons Transport Select Committee just to listen to their demands for road space, and public spending at the expense of drivers who are taxed to the tune of £50 Billion a year and not one single road safety or driving expert or dedicated drivers' group was invited to give evidence. I have now drawn this to the attention of the secretariat, showed the financial vested interest of one witness who pretended to be a pro driver expert, and have now forced a liaison with that important committee as a result. 
 
Surely The Cycle Lobby cannot have the floor all to them as they would seem to expect from their attacks on me?  So as a reasonable cyclist, and I have cycled for some sixty five years, at one time doing a daily fast sports style 30 mile London commute, I believe I represent the vast majority of cyclists who don’t seek to lobby against or make life harder for drivers.

Surely when any group makes so many demands from essential infrastructure and funding, and on the basis of the cycling casualties, it is the duty of any politician to be totally dispassionate and start from the basic.  The question it is their duty to ask is: ‘If there is so much wrong with road cycling, do we need it? Why do we need it?’ Of course it infuriates cyclists when I point this out. Having then thought of the question, clearly there is an answer.

The fact is that society wasn't built or sustained on manpower. We turned to the horse and camel thousands of years ago and expanded on fast, load bearing long distance non man powered transport, without which our current society wouldn't exist. Moving on to chariots, stages, wagons, traps, handsome cabs, coaches till they were eventually superseded by today’s motor transport.

An anti driver (anti as opposed to pro) pro cyclist campaigner has just published a book, 'Roads weren't built for cars'. They certainly existed and were used for thousands of years by fast, long distance, load bearing, non man powered transport with wheels, long before the bicycle was thought of. So they certainly weren't built for bicycles either. And this nonsense has been funded and supported with public money, mostly taken from car drivers.

The conclusion is a simple one. There are only two types of road user society must have and that’s walkers and drivers. The rest are indeed a non essential unnecessary liability and risk. Walkers and drivers are actually linked and paired closer, dependent on each other, than any other group is since both are essential for society's survival. Where would your paper be without both?

Are cyclists and politicians really suggesting that all the demands of the cycle lobby shouldn't require that simple question to be asked and answered? Does it make me such a bad man for asking it? ‘The Emperor’s New Clothes’? Do I deserve so much hatred for raising a fair question and coming to a very obvious conclusion too?

Back to road safety, my main concern.

Road cycling is placing one’s unprotected body in the path of, mixing and competing with, lots of heavy fast moving essential machinery operated by complete strangers of varying ability and mental capacity. Whether cyclists like that statement or not, it is the reality of the situation and the concept. The concept is one where, if it were being suggested now in 2014, it would be called mad. It is undoubtedly dangerous and a dangerous choice. Under any other circumstances we would never place ourselves in such a position. We wouldn't choose to run across a field where someone was spraying machine gun bullets, despite our right to do so, in case we may get hit. Road cycling is that lottery. 

Again that observation, corroborated by road cyclists being maimed and killed daily, brings so much venom and bile in my direction. However when journalists and politicians deny the truth while people are dying and being maimed by a concept just for an ideology borders on the irresponsible. Attacking the messenger adds to their culpability.

I am not anti cyclist because I am one but I have to address their demands and claims, for road safety sake, honestly and factually and I believe I do.

I hope that you will now have a much greater understanding about my voluntary work and take advantage of it if only to balance vested interest spin, and false statements that are undoubtedly made about road safety. Please don’t allow your local police or even your personal instincts embargo any of it, as that wouldn't be in the public interest.

Seeking comfort from and patronising a dishonest, anti driver, anti genuine road safety imaginary doggy, adds very little to the credibility of those who do and especially their associations if they are not supporting the road safety sense and truths behind it.

I would be prepared to come and talk with you on the whole issue of road safety if it would help a better understanding.

Wishes

Keith Peat
www.driversunion.co   
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Saturday, 25 January 2014

The truth is offensive to some on the road.

'But for the record, my statement is: 'There are only two types of road user that the community cannot manage without; walking and driving'.  The Spandex Taliban continue to pretend, in their childish manner of poking fun, that it translates somehow to 'Every car journey is essential'.'

'My colleagues and I support cycling and horse riding in their essential road transport needs.'

I must, for the sake of not having to repeat and regurgitate the same points on social media, address a couple of glaring road safety issues here on this blog so that, in future, for those with the sad disability of not being able to understand simple statements of truth, direct them to it thus saving me valuable time.

I am a cyclist. Not of the Spandex and Lycra clad, racing style al la Wiggins variety but more akin to the nice sedate upright style favoured in Europe and indeed towns like Oxford and Cambridge too.

In response to the demands of the cycling lobby, I have been looking at road cycling and for those interested, we have a whole section on the Drivers' Union Website under road safety, at Drivers' Union There you will be able to see how in peril road cyclists are as the crashes, injuries and deaths of top cyclists prove as do the sad examples of ordinary road cyclist casualties too. All this is not my opinion but factual events from which intelligent conclusions must be drawn.

The epithet: 'There is no fury like that of a woman scorned' is not true because the fury, insults, venom and bile directed at me, for merely looking at cycling safety on a pro driver basis, supports the proposition that anyone prepared to don Lycra and Spandex to ride their bike, especially head cam mounted too, can safely be added to 'the woman' in the epithet.

When we have such cycling luminaries as Carlton Reid, Clive Andrews and Barry Sheerman MP as well as the followers of at least three dishonest anti Keith Peat parody social accounts, then clearly Spandex/Lycra cyclists are a very touchy breed prone to dishonesty and personal abuse to protect their peculiar ideas.

Likewise there is the Horsey Set. Strangely having so much in common with the Cycling Crowd, in that both think they have unfettered right, well fettered in the case of a horse, to obstruct and slow other road users to the extent that, if drivers dare to be human and fail to live up to either group's expectations whilst passing, they can expect a reaction ranging from scorn to outright abuse and confrontation. See. Horses on public roads  The head cams are there specifically to catch drivers doing something wrong and to film any confrontation incited just for the camera. I advise all drivers to mount CCTV on their cars for their own protection.

But let's get my position on the record for once and for all.

I support horse riders by fighting for what they need most; their cars, 4 x4s, their horse boxes and to ensure that, this vital aspect of their lives, is better than it has been hitherto, with more justice for drivers, better road safety and less cost.  Let's face it, you can't keep horses without motors and driving and indeed you can't sustain your lifestyle without all that either. Given the choice: 'Horses or motor vehicles? You would have to give up the horses. So my colleagues and I are working for one of the most important and crucial aspects of your lifestyle that allows you to have and use horses.

But does society need these animals out on roads anymore? No it doesn't. So, from a drivers perspective, horses are an unnecessary hazard, liability, delay and bad news. Sorry but that is a truth and a fact. Drivers are entitled to wonder why they are having this liability imposed on them for the gratification and enjoyment of a privileged few and it's my job to ask the question without being ridiculed for doing so. The questions I asked here need to be answered for the sake of all driver safety and wellbeing. 'Why are horses still being ridden or driven on UKs roads in 2014?' is a good question and so far there hasn't been one single rational justification in response.

Likewise I support cyclists too in that every cyclist depends on drivers directly or indirectly and most depend on their own driving too. I am doing a service for cyclists in the more important aspect of their lives, motor transport.

Rather like horses, how on earth can cyclists be a boon to drivers? From a driver's perspective, they are a hazard, liability and an obstruction to best progress. That's a reality. But in making all the demands that cyclists are, our politicians would be failing in their duty not to include in their consideration, 'Who must we have on the road to sustain society?'  After all it is the cyclists who are saying how dangerous cycling is, demanding and getting valuable road space and public funds to make it safer so the question 'do we need them?' surely is a fair one isn't it? Or isn't anyone supposed to ask reasonable questions without being abused? From the violent reactions to it, the Cycle Lobby think not. Well I am asking it and trying to get more drivers to ask it for their own good too.

But for the record, my statement is: 'There are only two types of road user that the community cannot manage without; walking and driving'.  The Spandex Taliban continue to pretend, in their childish manner of poking fun, that it translates somehow to 'Every car journey is essential'. That dishonesty I can conclude is an admission that they cannot deny the real statement.

But I will go a bit further by addressing a typical example: 'Driving to the golf club is not essential road use' Yes it is. You cannot transport golf clubs on foot far enough or fast enough without motor transport. This keeps the golfing industry going. Why not say 'driving to the stables to muck the horse out and hitch the trailer for hay is taboo too?' Holidays? Packing a car up with wife & kids plus luggage and bikes to go to France can hardly be done on a bike but it keeps the ferry trade and holiday resorts in business too. But the essence of the use is that being on the road is always to go from A to B for a purpose; it's not for being on the road just for being on the road's sake and to imperiously expect your preference, to dictate your speeds to other road users.  It is very worrying that The Cycle Lobby are either too dumb to comprehend this or too dishonest. Either way, should politicians be taking so much notice of them or their demands?

It's about time the Cycle Lobby were give short shrift. 'Like it or get off your bikes.'



 
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Saturday, 28 December 2013

Rules 163 & 215 of the Highway Code need to reflect 2014 not 1900

The Highway Code, just like road safety policy itself, has developed over many years in a very piecemeal fashion. Like road safety itself, it has become too complex, often wrong and outdated.

Both road safety & The Highway Code need a bottom up review.

Two rules, 163 & 215 show clearly how road safety is out of date, wrong and thus dangerous.

They are both about drivers passing others on the road.

Rule 163 says, 'Give vulnerable road users at least as much space as you would when overtaking a car'.  How vague, subjective & meaningless is that? Different drivers have different ideas so, in effect, this means 'carry on as normal' to each. But the major fault in this is, that at very low speeds, drivers pass other obstacles, like parked cars, much closer, and often only by inches very safely and successfully all the time. So rule 163 makes no sense whatsoever and is utter nonsense.

Rule 215 says: 'Be particularly careful of horse riders and horse drawn vehicles especially when overtaking. Always pass wide and slowly. Horse riders are often children, so take extra care and remember riders may be in double file when escorting a young or inexperienced horse or rider. Look out for horse riders' and horse drivers' signals and heed requests to slow down and stop. Take great care and treat all horses as a potential hazard; They can be unpredictable, despite the efforts of their rider/driver.'
 
 
This is the Highway Code in 2014, actually accepting on our roads, large, unpredictable, hazards, that the riders are often unable to control despite all efforts and worse, in the hands of children too! If that isn't bad enough, horses, now obsolete as essential to the community for road transport, have become purely recreational. What other such recreation do we allow in the middle of our roads?
 
Roads and streets are not for play or are playgrounds. They are the tracks of essential infrastructure just like railway lines and airport runways are.  See horses-public-roads
 
 Isn't it about time the Highway Code started to reflect that fact? See Highway code in 100 words
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