Forget cycle promotion, try driver education

I am reading all over the net the debate about how to make cycling safer and that cyclists are being killed and injured on roads all over the developed world. The elephant in the room is the perpetrator is the motorist and  yet none of the responsibility is being given to them. Often the report starts with the fact that the person killed  was a cyclist that wasn't wearing a helmet, as if that makes it his fault. 
There are a few simple rules and facts that I think motorists are just not aware of and the facts and the fictions are mixed up.
Fiction: Road tax - drivers pay to use the roads, all other users that don't are cheap scum.
Fact: The roads are paid for by the tax we all pay and Vehicle Excise Duty is a tax on fuel emissions only - electric cars don't pay "road tax" either. This has been the case since the 1930's deliberately so that drivers don't get to own the roads that roads have been there in some cases since the Romans - the road outside my house has been there well before Henry VIII - it's called Lynn Road - before Henry VIII made Lynn into Kings Lynn. The roads were not built for cars but for transportation in general.
Fiction: I need to do be doing at least the speed limit and if something gets in my way, I need to overtake it.
Fact: The highway code says: The speed limit is the absolute maximum and does not mean it is safe to drive at that speed irrespective of conditions. Driving at speeds too fast for the road and traffic conditions is dangerous. You should always reduce your speed when

• the road layout or condition presents hazards, such as bends

• sharing the road with pedestrians, cyclists and horse riders, particularly children, and motorcyclists

• weather conditions make it safer to do so

• driving at night as it is more difficult to see other road users.

Fiction: I live, therefore I drive, and you are in my way.

Fact: this is the bit that I know to be fact but I can't find it anywhere - if you want to drive a motorised vehicle, you do so under licence and that implies by law that you have to have this licence, that you have insurance and that you abide by the highway code. Everywhere I search on the law that allows you to drive on the road, it tells you about how to get a licence. Nowhere does it say anything about what that licence is actually for - so that you and your vehicle can use the road. 

The road is never automatically yours, you are there under agreement to abide by the highway code and consider all users. 

Fiction: Driving is a human right, that without a car, you are not really a useful citizen.

Fact: Our bodies are designed to move us around and we are capable of travelling quite large distances under our own steam. Using our bodies as a means of transportation is what keeps our bodies in tune, like a motor. Use it or loose it. There are also many amazing inventions designed to transport lots of people around needing only one driver - a driver who as undergone special training and undertakes the responsibility for the safety of it's passengers....Public Transport! It's much safer too, you can read a book, listen to music, go for a wee, eat! it's amazing!

I read the section on Cycling and it's definitely not written by someone who rides a bike on a regular basis, and certainly not designed by someone who uses a bike for daily transportation.

I read the Higway Code section on cyclists and it says:

Clothing. You should wear

• a cycle helmet which conforms to current regulations, is the correct size and securely fastened
• appropriate clothes for cycling. Avoid clothes which may get tangled in the chain, or in a wheel or may obscure your lights
• light-coloured or fluorescent clothing which helps other road users to see you in daylight and poor light
• reflective clothing and/or accessories (belt, arm or ankle bands) in the dark.

For a start they use the word "should" bearing mind that they said drivers should reduce their speeds when...bla bla. So me not wearing a helmet to cycle to the shops is the same flouting the highway code as the driver who doesn't slow down to over take a cyclist in a built up area?

Back to bloody helmets! Statistically drivers should wear helmets to drive too, based on head injuries caused by accidents. People don't just fall off bikes in town and a helmet isn't a bullet proof vest, if drivers are going too fast and not paying attention, a helmet can't protect the rest of your body, it's not a bubble. It's not going to help if you are car doored under a bus.

I insist my kids wear a helmet at all times on a bike, it's very likely that if we stay in the UK it will become a habit that they will always have. Children are more likely to bang their heads when they fall off bikes, the studies show and brain injuries are by far the hardest to deal with. However,  when we move to Holland this will undoubtedly change and the helmet will become redundant, the rule is generally, cycling to school and round town, no helmet, riding on a road bike or mountain bike and going as fast as you can, wear a helmet.

My chain is completely enclosed and I have a dress guard, if I want to cycle in a dress or palazzo pants, I can (and do). Bikes, unlike 40 tonne lorries and cement mixers, don't have to be classified as industrial equipment.

I wear bright colours mostly anyway and I make sure there are reflective bits and lights on my bike and my kid's bikes. This again is not some recipe for safety - I know of plenty of cyclists who have been wearing hi-viz, lit up like a Christmas tree who have been hit by drivers who just weren't paying attention - they weren't working on the basis that they need to look out for vulnerable users on the road that's in a town and therefore there are people around not encased in metal. I grew up learning that you assume you haven't been seen and most canny road users will say, treat other users like they are a bit dim, give them plenty of space and the benefit of the doubt. 

Drivers need to be reminded and reminded that the roads are not theirs and theirs alone. That driving is a privilege, not a right and it comes with as much responsibility as a firearm.

The licence should be earned and if abused, should be revoked. In doing so, you also in turn need to make sure that there are always other means of getting to work - it should be unacceptable to expect people to work somewhere where they have to be able to drive to get there. Shops should be in walking distance, have bus stops and the ability to deliver where relevant (most of them already do). 

When the driving licence became viewed as a right, probably some time in the 70s or 80s when the government saw pound signs flashing in their eyes with North Sea Oil, the right to public transport became optional and so the years of neglect for all other means of transportation continued. 

All our money goes on air ambulances, trauma units for car crashes and all the illness associated with inactivity and stress. 

Don't put all the focus on the 2% who use a bike, try the other 98%, that might be much more effective no?