Our latest reader survey asks whether the use of cycle helmets should be mandatory.
THIS SURBEY HAS NOW CLOSED
HAVE YOUR SAY: cycle helmets
11.13 | 9 October 2023 | | 8 comments
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Your poll will tell us nothing other than the views of a subset of your readers. It would be wrong to assume that all your readers have any experience or qualifications in road safety.
Rod King, Lymm
+14
This comes up pretty regularly and every time people who cycle have to carefully explain why it’s ridiculous (I’m sure there are some keen cyclists who agree with it). The government repeatedly looks into this and finds it would be a really silly idea.
Bradford
+22
Some of the best evidence on cycle helmets is found here. https://www.cyclehelmets.org/
Ken Spence, Leeds
+8
The answer is safer roads, not mandatory helmets. Multiple issues, main one being we need more people to use bikes and mandatory helmets would result in fewer riders. Head injuries regularly occur in car accidents – is there a call for drivers to have mandatory helmets? Then you have the issue of helmets exacerbating certain kinds of injuries (contra coup brain injuries) and the fact that people wearing helmets are in more accidents and are passed more closely by drivers.
There’s a reason why almost nobody wears helmets in the Netherlands. Safer roads are the answer.
Iain, Poole
+32
If helmets were effective protection then all motorists should be made to wear one.
Common sense
+23
How does wearing a polystyrene bowl on a head stop a motor vehicle from smashing into a person on a bike?
Birmingham hit the news this summer with road violence caused by careless drivers. Maybe we need penalties for drivers killing and injuring people to be equal to other methods of killing and injuring people. That may go some way to fixing part of the problem.
Gareth Massey, Birmingham
+28
Can you provide links to the pros and cons of mandatory helmet wearing so people can make a educated judgement?
Roger Stocker, London
+60
Cyclists and cycle shops should be more responsible towards safety.
Cycle shops should provide Lights and Helmits by law at the point of sale of all cycles!
Grahame Wells, Hull
--98