Protest rides against the European Commission’s proposed EU Regulations for motorcycles took part in the UK in September and recently riders protested in Brussels on the Motorcycle News (MCN) UK weekly newspapers protest ride.
Over the last few months, UK rider organisations have been using inflammatory rhetoric to gain support for these protests. This rhetoric has been based on theorizing and deriving conclusions to what the proposal may (or may not) mean for motorcycling.
Facts have been confused with supposition and the consequence of this is that it has led to panic and anti-EU hysteria. All of this appears to be a lack of understanding of the proposal.
At Right To Ride we have looked at the publically available proposal and the amendments that have been submitted by MEPs and we’ve been in regular contact with the office of the Chair of the IMCO committee. These amendments (more than 300) are due to be voted on at the rescheduled meeting on 5th December of the Internal Market and Consumer Protection (IMCO).
Whatever the result of this vote is (what amendments are accepted or rejected), there will be a final report which is then placed on the agenda of the European Parliament for all MEPs to vote on, although additional amendments to this report can be tabled to Parliament under certain procedures.
However a number of MEP amendments have already been withdrawn, because they were outside the scope of the regulation.
We wonder in a European utopia of citizens’ democracy how these MEPs decided to submit their amendments, where these amendments came from or whether they were discussed with motorcyclists.
We also wonder if motorcyclists or rider representatives contacted members of the IMCO committee, or, is there an unseen “battle” of other lobby forces taking place, while MEPs fail to grasp the complex technical issues surrounding motorcycles?
Right now we are pretty disgusted with what is being reported by these organisations and we feel that the time has come to challenge the hype and misinformation.
We have written to the main protagonists concerned with the MCN protest ride, MCN’s Steve Farrell the BMF’s Chris Hodder and the MAG President Ian Mutch.
We asked them, why they did not use their positions to contact the IMCO Chairman and the European Commission when they had the opportunity while in Brussels?
Because if they had, they would have found that most of the information that they are disseminating is either incorrect or misleading, running with what appears to be visceral anti-European propaganda which in the end does nothing to change the issues regarding these proposals.
We are now asking this trio and the organisations that they represent, to explain clearly and precisely how and why they came to the conclusions that they have made and with what evidence.
At Right To Ride we ask, “Do you really know what you are talking about, do you actually believe what you are writing?” Because these communications circulating around motorcycle forums, motorcycle social network sites, riders blogs and forums certainly seem to have created enormous confusion, and appear to have become the accepted truth.
The future of motorcycling is important to all of us and we need to know the facts, so that we can grasp the consequences of the proposed regulations.
Information
Read the full article at Right To Ride EU – Click Here
You can view video interviews conducted by Europe & You from Malcolm Harbour, Riders, Marta Andreasen, Motorcycle News own video broadcast and a video from the Motorcycle Action Group local group Folkstone and Dover.
These may which may help you as riders to ask questions and split out what the proposal means for motorcycling from the hype and misinformation.
