Why nobody seems to be able to make their mind up about e-scooters

Young boys and men appear to be over-represented in statistics. Of the casualties, 302 were males aged 10-19 (the most across all age and gender categories).

Six deaths were recorded in 2024, unchanged from the previous year. Five of them were cyclists and one was a pedestrian.

Although the numbers are not exact, it is thought that more accidents occur on private e-scooters. Winchcomb said police statistics “do not reflect the number of injuries.”

However, campaigners believe there is sufficient evidence to show that regulation is urgently needed.

Carly Calland’s 14-year-old son Jacob died in March 2025 from a catastrophic head injury. He was a passenger on an e-scooter that collided with a car.

Carly believes that if privately owned e-scooters are legalized for public use, helmets should be made mandatory, carrying passengers should be banned, and parents who allow children to ride illegally should be penalized.

“If Jacob had been wearing a helmet that day he would still be here,” says Carly, from Wythenshawe in Greater Manchester.

Carly isn’t against e-scooters. He tells me that they are “really good and environmentally friendly for people to get started with,” but “they just need to be used the right way.”

What happens if the current situation continues? The answer is definitive: “More deaths.”