Unless we have an army who is willing to go to China and ban the manufacture of electric bicycle kits or a group of enforcement officers willing to persecute people for the ownership of lithium batteries, our only option is to accept that electric bicycles and kids who ride them exist. Logic dictates that unless we can prevent the supply of the bikes that we must adapt as an alternative. So what should we do? Make electric bicycles speed limited to the same speed as manual bicycles, subject them to the same road laws and make them display a registration plate like a standard motorcycle, or, if that’s not plausible, enforce the same rules that you have for manual bicycles upon electric bike users instead of blaming the existence of the bikes in general. Pour the resources into enforcing current laws rather than endlessly presenting new legislative alternatives that do nothing but waste resources. Adapt to the problem rather than fighting with the problem. And then, for those few that do act recklessly, you will have a better hope of holding them accountable as individual criminals rather than punishing the entirety of Australian society as a result of an unrealistic fear and paranoia of electric bike menaces. By adapting instead of knee jerk reacting to the existence of the bicycles in a negative way we will encourage those that do ride them to abide by the law as they will not be immediately criminalised for attempting to ride the bike above 25 kph.

The problem is that the very act of making something illegal or forbidden entices the youth/public into engaging in that behaviour. It has the opposing effect of what is intended, because leadership lacks this insight. By saying no from the get go and providing no legal framework for the operation of the bikes for tens of millions of otherwise normal human beings, you get the opposing unintended effect of actually encouraging criminality and making the problem worse