Zebedee Tring

Boris Johnson has not decided to let children under ten cycle on the pavements; he hasn't got the power to change the law at a stroke, much as he might wish to do so. What he has in fact done is to back calls for children to be allowed to cycle on the pavement. He acknowledges that currently this is illegal.

Noted, uppereastsider. However, will the Schonrocks now stop their children cycling to school on the pavement and thus breaking the law? If they cycle to school, they should travel on the roads like all law-abiding people. Surely parents have a duty to get their kids to obey and respect the law.

I agree, Minkey. In the 50s I went to a prep school (not in this area) where the Deputy Head spent much of his time spanking boys who he had told to take their clothes off and where beatings were routine for the most minor offence. I then went to a minor public school (again not in this area) where the previous year the PE master had been sacked for throwing a javelin at a boy (he missed), where boys had to swim naked in the outdoor swimming pool and where monitors were allowed to beat other boys. No CRB checks and Health and Safety in those days. Of course they were the bad old days, but we have gone too far the other way.

When I first read this thread, I was inclined to support the parents and to take the view that the school's reaction was somewhat over the top. I have now read that the parents told their kids to cycle to the school on the pavement and not on the road. If this is true, it is highly regrettable that parents should encourage their kids to break the law in this way. And there is no exemption for kids of eight and under from the provisions of the Highways Acts barring cycling on the footway. We live near Alleyns and are bedevilled by Alleyns kids, other school kids and other cyclists, including people who seem to think that they are taking part in the Tour de France, cycling at speed on the pavement. Recently I had the misfortune to encounter a most unpleasant teenager who, when I told him that he shouldn't be cycling on the pavement, replied with a very supercilious 'And your point is?' (a deeply annoying and overused phrase in itself). I told him what my point was in no uncertain terms and forced him on to the road. Rather than trying to make an example of the Schonrock parents, the Alleyns head would be performing a better service for us by emphasising to his pupils that it is totally unacceptable for them to cycle to school on the pavement.

Actually, Narnia, I'm an old rustic from 'The Archers' who died in 1973 but who rose again in order to contribute to this message board.

The weakness of the argument about bringing back conscription is that a whole load of young people would be taught how to use seriously dangerous weaponry and that when they were discharged from the army into the world of unemployment that is sure to be prevalent for a number of years the geezers who administer casual violence would be fitter and more dangerous than before they were conscripted.

When I was a lad I used to walk barefoot six miles to school every day through six feet snowdrifts. And when I got to school I was regularly flayed alive. But it did me no harm - in fact it made me the man that I am today. Them kids today have it soft.

There are some serial offenders who walk their dogs along Beauval Road, often via Milo Road. On one occasion I caught a dog in the act and asked one of these geezers to pick up the carp, but he said that he hadn't brought anything with him to do this. I said that if I saw him do it again I would report it, but he just grunted and walked away. He was fairly young and about 6ft, but as I am 6ft 2in I wasn't too worried about reprisals. If I had been smaller I might have thought twice about doing this. The 'Rambo' side of my id fantasises about rolling offenders in the brown stuff or worse. The real, respectable side of me of course would never dream of doing this!

The first time that it was proposed that the Bakerloo Line should be extended was nearly 80 years ago in the early 30s, and a proposed extension to Camberwell was shown on Underground maps for some years, along with the subsequently abandoned Northern Line extension to Ally Pally and elsewhere. Since then other southbound Bakerloo extensions have been proposed but nothing has been implemented. So don't hold your breath.

The post is absolutely diabolical at the moment. We're getting about two deliveries a week and post that should have arrived about 10 days ago still hasn't arrived. I'm particularly concerned about tickets for a US trip beginning on 4 October which seem to be caught up in the backlog - they should have arrived by last weekend and I need to register online for travel authorisation with the US authorities a few days before I leave.

Internet item from 19/11/07: 'A cyclist who caused the death of a man by riding ?furiously? has escaped a jail sentence. Peter Messen pedalled down a hill at around 25 mph before hitting Gary Green as he loaded his car in preparation for a holiday with his girlfriend. Messen mounted the kerb on his Apollo mountain bike just as Green stepped onto the pavement, knocking him unconscious to the floor. Green died four days later on April 3 last year after suffering serious head injuries. Messen was given a 12-month suspended jail sentence and 300 hours of community service. He had pleaded guilty to the offence of ?causing bodily harm by wanton or furious cycling under the Offences Against the Person Act 1861, which carried a maximum jail sentence of two years'. He was extremely lucky to get away with what was in effect a slap on the wrist.

Yes, and remember that a number of cyclists have actually killed pedestrians when cycling on the pavement or ignoring traffic lights/pedestrian crossings. It isn't a trivial matter

Titchy juice, please note Administrator's note above about posters insulting each other. For the record, I was nearly knocked down by the bike in question, which was travelling at speed. If he had hit me, the good news is that Kings A&E was opposite. The bad news is that he, like other cyclists hitting pedestrians, could have killed me, which would have been harrowing for my wife in a year in which one of my sons died of leukaemia and she spend several months in hospital with MRSA.

SCS, since I am 6ft 2in and heavily built, if you came face to face with me in the street, you would not call me a 'nob', not unless you were rather reckless. You can disagree with me as much as you like, but you cannot descend to gratuitous insults on this Board. There is far too much of this sort of language on chat rooms these days. Unless you withdraw that insult, I will contact the moderator and ask for you to be banned from the Board. I hope that the moderator is observing this.

Two wrongs don't make a right, SCSB79 (or may I be so familiar as to call you 'SCS'?) Pedestrians who walk in front of bicycles (and indeed cars) deserve all they get as well. And it was the bloke's bike that I kicked, not the cyclist himself. And who exactly are you addressing as a 'nob'?

Puzzled, you will be pleased to hear that once when a cyclist rode along Denmark Hill across a pedestrian crossing near Kings and nearly knocked me over, I gave one of the wheels of his bike a bluddy good kicking and he nearly came off it. Mr Barber, the Dulwich College boys about whom I was complaining were at the time cycling nowhere near Dulwich College but were cycling on the pavement in a couple of roads near Alleyns where the pavement is not shared between pedestrians and cyclists. If children of secondary school age are too nervous to cycle on the road, then they shouldn't cycle at all and either use public transport to get to school, or indeed walk. A nice brisk walk from ED to Dulwich College every day would do these boys a power of good.

When walking back from the newsagent this morning with my Grauniad under my arm, I was nearly run over by three boys wearing the uniform of Dulwich College who were speedily cycling on the pavement. I told them that they should cycle on the road; however, Dulwich College boys are not as well brought up as in the good old days and they totally ignored me and continued cycling on the pavement. I then encountered another Dulwich College boy cycling on the pavement adjacent to his yummy mummy who was cycling on the road. When I remonstrated with her she said that the police had told her that children could cycle on the pavement up to the age of 14. I replied that this was a likely story, to which said yummy mummy in turn replied that this would stop him being knocked off his bike. I should have in turn replied 'What about me being knocked over by a bluddy bike?', but there seemed to be little point remonstrating with her further as she was clearly beyond redemption. Surely this stuff about kids up to 14 being allowed to ride on the pavement is a load of what might euphemisticall be called bolleaux. To quote a legal website that I have consulted, 'Cycling on footways (a pavement at the side of a carriageway) is prohibited by Section 72 of the Highway Act 1835, amended by Section 85(1) of the Local Government Act 1888. This is punishable by a fixed penalty notice of ?30 under Section 51 and Schedule 3 of the Road Traffic Offenders Act 1988.' . What do other people think?

About three years ago I made a complaint to Transport for London about a driver on the 37 route who was very rude to me and among other things told me to eff off. TfL dealt with my complaint and indicated that they had taken disciplinary action against the toerag in question. So it is worth complaining if a bus driver is rude to you.

If people don't want BNP candidates to get elected, it's not good enough just to say 'A plague on all their houses - I won't vote for any of them'. You've got to get out and vote for some other party than the BNP, otherwise they will win seats by default.

Nothing like a nice bit of panic buying at the slightest provocation. No doubt, dulwichmum, when you get a little sniffle, you will hire Max Clifford as your publicist to promote your article 'My days of sniffle hell in Dulwich'.

When reading the views of those on this thread who apparently wish to opt out of paying their taxes for state education and other services that they don't use, I am reminded of the words of one of my least favourite politicians of the last 40 years, one Margaret Thatcher, who notoriously said 'There is no such thing as society'.

Yeah, i no words like curtilage, innit, cos i woz a lawyer - and parked my ass at a pubic school for seven years (irony alert).

I do find the focus on coaches as a bugbear within this thread odd. They are clearly an efficient way of getting a lot of pupils to school Noted, but as I have already asked twice on this thread, why can't the coaches park on the extensive land witin the schools' curtilages rather than cause obstructions on the public roads?

For the avoidance of doubt, what I was saying was totally unfair was the suggestion that the Dulwich Village Schools were private schools paid for by the taxpayer. In fact 'unfair' is an extremely understated way of describing it.

This is totally unfair. Some kids may move from Dulwich Village Infants and the Hamlet to the private sector, but a considerable number, including my two sons, didn't. And among what would now be called their 'cohort' were a sizeable number of kids who, for want of a better categorisation, were 'working class' - in the most positive sense.