CEO Update: Queensland’s draft e-mobility laws

From Dr. Matthew Burke

Over 3,200 submissions were received by the Parliamentary Committee reviewing Queensland’s proposed new e-mobility laws. This is one of the biggest out-pourings of concern about a piece of legislation the Parliament has seen in the last decade. The local bicycle user groups (BUGs), especially the Brisbane and Toowoomba BUGs, Space for Cycling and the Story Bridge Active Travel Alliance, have all worked tirelessly. Thank you everyone! Well done! 

Analysis of the submissions conducted by the bike advocacy community reveals only 4% or less of the thousands of submissions released thus far are likely form-letter responses. That’s incredibly low for submissions to an inquiry like this. What this shows is that Queenslanders from all walks of life are clearly unimpressed with the proposed laws and have taken the time to write genuine submissions.

More than 90% of the submissions support Bicycle Queensland’s positions. Queenslanders don’t want car licences for safe, legal e-bikes. They don’t want 10km/h speeds. They don’t want shared paths and rail trails treated like footpaths. They don’t want low age limits. They want all the safe, legal e-bikes they’ve purchased to stay compliant.

Andrew Demack, BQ’s Director of Advocacy, and I appeared as witnesses to the committee in late April, along with a who’s who of affected stakeholders. The Bicycle Industries Australia, the Brisbane West Bicycle Users Group, the Brisbane Valley Rail Trail Association, Lime, Neuron, Uber-Eats, Doordash, the Queensland Tourism Industry Council, the big local governments, the disability sector, the Public Advocate, and even a coalition of 15 Queensland transport professors. The message received by the Committee was loud and clear throughout: this bill has been badly drafted; there are issues that are not yet resolved; and, as BQ has made abundantly clear, the key problem of the illegal devices won’t be fixed. The bill still allows the same shops selling the same illegal bikes and scooters to remain in business and keep selling their same illegal products under the ‘private property use only’ loophole. This is the same way every illegal device currently on the streets has already been sold in Queensland.  

At this late stage we hope the bill is at least delayed, if not pulled entirely, for a rethink. BQ has long had ‘off-ramps’ available to the government to help solve this mess.  

We know proof-of-age would give the Queensland Police Service all they need to clamp down on illegal device riders – who the cops need to ID – without the overkill of requiring cyclists to have a driver’s licence. Changing this in the bill would solve all the discriminatory issues compulsory licence-holding creates for the disabled, seniors, international students and others. This would keep our shared e-mobility schemes (Lime, Neuron) alive in Queensland and allow international tourists to use them during the Olympics. It would keep Uber-Eats drivers in a job and ensure Dominos can still get a pizza to your door.   

We know that if the Department can do a good job defining a footpath in the legislation, they can then achieve what the Parliamentary Committee wanted in placing a speed restriction on footpaths, but leave alone all the shared paths, rail trails and shared multi-use trails that cyclists use. That would stop forcing local governments to spend hundreds-of-millions of dollars across the state assessing, then signing, every shared path or trail they want to assign a non-default speed to. We also know that cyclists are much more stable, upright, and able to manage road risk at 15km/h or 20km/h than at 10km/h, if the government remains determined to put a speed limit just on footpaths. 

We know the Bicycle Industries Australia proposal for e-bike compliance/assurance to be provided by retailers, and labelled on a sticker on the frame, would provide a pathway to compliance for those of us without a permanent standards mark on our safe, legal e-bikes. This would also help the police with enforcement. The bike industry has already thought through how this can work.  

We are calling on the Transport Minister to intervene and #savelegalebikes. There were signs the Committee members have realised the unintended consequences of the proposed laws, and are considering the possible ways out.

Minister Mickelberg can step in and save this.