US laws

[pete75]

nuff said
Accidents happen!

Especially when the following drivers aren't paying attention...… But hey we'll let them continue, otherwise motorists will be upset!

Typical "blame culture" response someone has to pay blah,blah,blah
It was an ACCIDENT.Accidents happen.If you try to blame one party then it ceases to become an accident It's the same everywhere now..why are people intent on blaming someone?
Modern society where accidents aren't allowed to be called accidents any more

Mr Quigley has made his(very sensible)statement so maybe leave it at that instead of jumping on the BC bandwagon?

So if you're out on your bike and somebody in a car runs into the back of you, smashes your bike and incapacitates you your view will be they're not to blame. You wouldn't want the police to prosecute them or for them to pay for your bike to be repaired or replaced or cover you for any financial loss resulting from the event.

[mattheus]

I agree with Kwackers' post, but how we manage this in the UK system is hard.

Firstly, I think Presumed Liability is an excellent (and fair, and tested) compromise that deals with crashes where Driver A is clearly responsible, but they would argue it was an "accident", and they have various excuses - this often makes prosecution hard, but as they are insured it should be simple to get compo paid to the victim.

2ndly, we could look at workplace accidents. Even when there is no malice, if I injured Mr Quigley in that manner at work there would an almighty kerfuffle. All sorts of measures would kick in, which might include; retraining, suspension from the task, suspension from work, suspending the process and/or whole department etc …

The laws around workplace safety are well tested and have evolved significantly over the last century, resulting in a MASSIVE reduction in serious injuries at work. I know people whine and moan about the occasional over-the-top safety measure, but if you showed them the plain numbers of lives saved I think they'd quieten down PDQ.