PETER HITCHENS: Blood still spatters the path from an e-bike collision my wife witnessed. Why is the Government so deaf to their danger?

PETER HITCHENS: Blood still spatters the path from an e-bike collision my wife witnessed. Why is the Government so deaf to their danger? By Peter Hitchens for The Daily Mail Published: 01:56, 29 August 2024 | Updated: 01:57, 29 August 2024 e-mail View comments There was blood on the track as I made my way to work yesterday morning. Yes, actual human blood, a substantial patch of gore, slowly drying on the bonded gravel surface of a busy cycle path.

It was, I happen to know, the blood of a cyclist, involved in what I must call a ‘collision’ with a far faster, far heavier electric bike. This took place on Sunday. My wife, Eve, saw the horrible aftermath, but not the crash, and arrived home soon afterwards, white-faced and shocked, saying: ‘It could have been me.

’ Mrs Hitchens is no softie. She has seen some pretty awful things, especially when we lived in Moscow where traffic victims could be left for long periods by the roadside and the Soviet-era ambulances were often streaked with blood that nobody bothered to wash off. But that was savage, raw, semi-civilised Soviet Moscow.

This was beautiful, ultra-civilised, gentle Oxford. On this occasion, she saw a small group of people gathered round an unconscious fellow-creature, bleeding from his head, pale and still. This being Oxford, one of those at hand was a doctor, who briskly told the 999 operator that the case looked pretty serious, and an ambulance must come.

It did, though the paramedics had to reach the scene on f.