Cycling – An Overview
Cycling describes not only riding bicycles for recreation, but also the professional sport.
Cycling is thought to have a number of benefits both to the individual, in economic and health terms, and to society generally, particularly as an environmentally friendly means of transport.
Environmentally, encouraging people to travel by ‘no polluting’ bikes rather than car, helps to improve air quality. In some UK cities levels, NO2 levels breach legal limits and the particulate matter from car exhausts is known to exacerbate a number of health conditions such a respiratory and heart conditions.
Emissions of CO2 from the transport sector are also the largest source of CO2 emissions, and cycling therefore contributes to the debate around climate change.
In terms of public health and obesity, cycling, and particularly cycling to work, is portrayed as a key way in which adults can achieve the recommended 150 minutes of physical activity per week. The lack of physical activity is said to have a financial cost to the NHS, whilst taking exercise has been shown to improve mental health, and reduce the risks of heart disease, a range of cancers, stroke, type 2 diabetes.
A report by Cambridge University for British Cycling in 2014 estimated that the NHS would save £250 million a year if people replaced swapped 5 minutes, of their average 36 minutes in a car each day, for a bike.
Cycling has also been shown to bring economic benefits. The International Transport Forum has previously estimated that the cycling industry contributed £2.9 billion to the economy.
In 2015, the transport charity Sustrans suggested that the financial savings from walking and cycling (mainly emanating from health benefits) have saved the UK £7 billion in the previous two decades.
In 2016, a commissioned report for the Department for Transport suggested that infrastructure costs in less car dependent metropolises were 33% less than in car oriented urban sprawl’.
3x The cycling to work scheme is one part of the government’s cycling policy.
The cycle to work scheme
What is the cycle to work scheme
The Cycle to Work Scheme allows for tax relief to apply to loans of bicycles and cycling equipment which are used by employees to as part of a cycle commute to work.
Employees who participate in the scheme are able to make significant savings on the cost of a new bike, given that with a portion of their salary notionally allocated to their purchase of the associated cycling equipment, they will pay less tax and national insurance.
To be eligible for this tax relief, employees require their employers to have set up a cycle to work scheme. Employers are though not formally required to do so, but there are also financial benefits to them in doing so, given that they would reduce their Employers National Insurance contributions by 13.8% on the value of all equipment supplied.
The cycle to work scheme was originally limited to a maximum value of £1,000, albeit in 2019 the government increased the threshold when the purchase related specifically to electrically assisted bikes (e-bikes) which frequently cost more than this level.
Tax relief for Cycle to Work Schemes was first introduced in the 1999 Finance Act. Details of the tax relief relating to cycling to work are contained in HMRC’s Employment Income Manual.
The success of the cycle to work scheme
In 2019, the Cycle to Work Alliance estimated that that the Cycle to Work Scheme had encouraged over 1.6 commuters, across 40,000 employers, to cycle to work.
Re-enforcing the success of the policy in encouraging people into cycling, the Cycle to Work Alliance has detailed survey data that suggest that 62% of participants in the scheme were previous non cyclists, novice cyclists, or occasional cyclists. After joining the scheme, 79% of those surveyed categorised themselves as enthusiastic cyclists.
Cycling to work is seen as one of the main ways in which people can tap into the health benefits brought about through regular cycling. Where some have suggested that the risk of exposure to air pollution may deter people from cycling to work, this has been disproved by academics from Cambridge University.
In 2016, they found that even in Delhi, where air pollution is said to be 10 times higher than London, people would need to cycle for more than five hours a week for the damage to outweigh the benefits.
Wider cycling policy
Background
Cycling is generally believed to have begun in the early 1800s, with the development of the earliest bikes. Early bikes were commonly made from wood, had three wheels and lacked brakes and rubber tyres. The ‘Penny Farthing’ – also known as the ‘high’ or ‘ordinary’ bicycle – was invented in 1871 by James Starley. It succeeded earlier models known as the ‘Hobbyhorse’, and the ‘Velocipede’ or ‘Boneshaker’.
The bicycle of the modern age, sometimes referred to as the ‘safety bicycle’, was first produced in 1892. Since this time the bike has evolved enormously, with the concept of cycling as a sport and the demands of various terrains as the principal catalysts for change.
Successive Governments have tried to encourage cycling as a healthy alternative to motor transport. Cycle lanes have been constructed, lockers provided and measures have been introduced to reduce theft, such as serial number stamping schemes.
Nonetheless, Britain, and London in particular, does not have the cycling culture that prevails in other European countries and cities. The British weather, topography, and safety concerns are all thought to discourage people from cycling. Environmental groups say that the movement of facilities and services out of city and town centres is also to blame.
Cycling Initiatives – 1995 to 2020
In 1995 the Conservative Government of John Major created the National Cycle Network (NCN) and published a National Cycling Strategy. The Strategy aimed to double the number of bike trips between 1996 and 2002, and quadruple the number of trips by 2012.
Subsequently local authorities were expected to establish local strategies for cycling as part of their Local Transport Plans (LTPs). In 2008 the Labour Government of Gordon Brown stated its plan to increase the cycling budget by 500% over three years with investment in infrastructure improvements and schemes such as Bikeability.
This was followed by a 2011 White Paper on cycling from the incoming coalition government which promised further support for cycling. In 2017, as part of a new cycling and walking investment strategy, the government set out the objective to double cycling, where cycling activity is measured as the estimated total number of cycle stages made each year, from 0.8 billion stages in 2013 to 1.6 billion stages in 2025;
in July 1996 published a National Cycling Strategy. The aim of the Strategy was to double the number of trips by bicycle (on 1996 figures) by the end of 2002 and to quadruple the number of trips by the end of 2012
Current Cycling Policy – 2020-
The government’s current cycling policy is set out in the 2020 document, ‘Gear Change: A bold vision for cycling and walking’.
Prime Minister, Boris Johnson, someone who himself likes to be regularly seen on a bike, described the plan as ‘the most ambitious plans yet to boost cycling and walking’.
Mr Johnson had previously introduced the ‘London cycle hire scheme’ (colloquially known as ‘Boris Bikes’) in 2010 during his period as Mayor of London.
As part of this programme, the government allocated £2 billion of ring fenced funding for walking and cycling to be oversee and administered by a new body, ‘Active Travel England’.
GPs are also being encouraged to prescribe cycling with patients able to access bikes through their local doctor’s practice. The Highway code is also set to be strengthened with better legal protections for cyclists and other vulnerable road users.
In May 2020, as part of its response to the Coronavirus pandemic and ensuing national lockdown situation, the government said that it hoped the period would lead to a ‘new golden age for cycling’.
Future reforms to cycling policy?
Cycling campaigners continue to campaign for further measures to be taken to support cycling in the UK. Campaigners regularly point to the cycle friendly environments that exist in the Netherlands and Denmark, where 71% of the Dutch population and 56% of the Danish population are said to cycle once per week.
In recent years there have been campaigns, such as that ‘Funding for Cycling’ campaign, to increase cycling spend per head to £10 per person per year.
This level is said to have been achieved in London, and the 2017 Cycling and Walking Infrastructure Plans suggested that spend on cycling in England had more than tripped from £2 in 2010 to £6 in 2016/17.
Cycling campaigners such as Cycling UK, point to how the current £400 million of public expenditure per year spent on cycling equates to 1.5% of total public expenditure, which they argue remains adequate.
It is further suggested that fears around safety deter people from cycling, with Department of Transport statistics suggesting that 62% of adults in England believing it was too dangerous to cycle on the roads.
These fears also appear to be borne out by road accident statistics, which show the casualty rates per billion passenger miles (5,265) to be some 23 times higher than that for motorists (223). Fatality rates for cyclists are also said to be 15 times higher than for motorists.
Although gardening is still said to lead to more injuries than cycling, the government is committed to improve the safety for cycling.
Its 2019 Road Safety Statement focused in particular on collisions involving Heavy Goods Vehicles and vulnerable road users such as cyclists. Additional initiatives are focusing on reviewing the Highway Code, toughening enforcement against parking in cycle lands, investing in police capability to handle footage provided through dash cameras, and creating new types of traffic lights for cyclists to give them a ‘head start’ at junctions.
Some cyclists groups have also suggested that the law should be changed to make a driver automatically presumed liable for any accident involving their vehicle and a cyclist, in reflection that the consequences of an accident are likely to be far more serious for the cyclist.
Additionally there remains a debate as to whether it should be compulsory for cyclists to wear a helmet.
