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Calls for Updated Mobility Scooters laws
08th March 2010
Legislation governing mobility scooters should be updated and drivers offered better training, it has been claimed. Members of the Commons Transport Committee were given a list of people in Essex and Norfolk who had been killed or injured in scooter incidents. Norfolk Police told members that drivers do not take a test and cannot be prosecuted under current laws. An Essex disability group said the list of fatal or dangerous incidents involving drivers "goes on". Richard Boyd from the campaign group Disability Essex told the committee: "One lady in Chelmsford fell off her scooter and was killed by it."Blind driver He added: "Another lady in Clacton was taking her dog for a walk on the sea front, the dog pulled the scooter over and it fell on her and killed her."In Wickford, a blind gentleman drove across the road and was hit by a bus, and so it goes on."Supt Jim Smerdon from Norfolk Police said: "If a person is drunk in charge of a mobility scooter we use an act from 1872 I believe, 'drunk in charge of a carriage,' which needs to be updated."Penny Carpenter, an officer with the Norfolk Constabulary, runs indoor courses for scooter users in Great Yarmouth She told the committee: "One woman with double cataracts drove through a plate glass window in Gorleston."She is still using her scooter."The committee will consider the evidence and decide in future whether more training and updated legislation is needed.
