As Taoiseach Micheál Martin considers an e-scooter ban in Ireland, the real question is whether banning legal, regulated e-scooters will improve public safety or simply distract from the failure to enforce existing laws on illegal vehicles and criminal misuse asks Geraldine Herbert It seems an extraordinary response that Taoiseach Micheál Martin has said he is “leaning towards” a ban on e-scooters following growing concerns over serious injuries and the misuse of e-scooters and scramblers by criminal gangs. The first is a public health issue the second is criminality. Somehow, the proposed solution is to conflate the two. Let’s be absolutely clear Ireland has a genuine public health issue when children are ending up in emergency departments because of e-scooter collisions. Clinicians are right to demand action. But action and overreaction are not the same thing. We already have laws for this The State already has a legal framework in place for regulated e-scooters. It specifies who can ride them, how fast they can go, how powerful they can be and what safety equipment they must have. Anything outside those rules is already illegal. It also passed Grace’s Law, giving Gardaí stronger powers to seize scramblers and quad bikes from those using them illegally. Why ban the legal ones? So if illegal vehicles are being ridden illegally by criminals, and illegal vehicles can already be seized… why is the answer to ban the legal ones? A blanket ban would punish people who obey the law, undermine a regulatory system the Government only recently introduced, and blur the distinction between compliant e-scooters, illegal high-powered imports and scramblers used by gangs. Enforce the laws already there Why not Enforce the laws already on the books. Target illegal imports. Police age limits and speed restrictions. Stop retailers selling illegal machines alongside children’s scooters as though they’re just another toy. Make it illegal to market e-scooters to children. We didn’t ban cars because of drink-driving We didn’t respond to drink-driving by banning cars. We tackled the behaviour. We changed the law. We enforced it. We educated people. If the problem is criminals, then deal with criminals. If the problem is illegal vehicles, then get illegal vehicles off the streets. A ban would be an admission of failure But if the answer to every enforcement challenge is to ban the thing that’s already regulated, you have to wonder why we bothered regulating it in the first...