Two-wheeled vandals

Under the guise of environmental responsibility, Mr Hattersley reveals, these two-wheeled vandals have unleashed a reign of terror in our city streets. He and his dog, Buster, can no longer cross the road without feeling under threat from them. These kamikaze cyclists, as he calls them, are lawless; they are homicidal. They have, he asserts, been known to ride on the pavement. They have been seen jumping the lights. They are to be found, he reports alarmingly "all over central London, bouncing up and down the kerbs, dodging the wastebins and making sharp turns round old ladies with walking sticks." (They are lucky the ladies don't poke their sticks where they belong - between the spokes of their bikes.)

"Thigh-hugging"

In an elegiac passage Mr Hattersley foresees his own death at the hands of one of these hit-and-run cyclists - on the pedestrian crossing at the foot of Constitution Hill. It is a scene of heart-rending pathos: Mr Hattersley and his faithful hound - a perfectly-trained companion animal for sure, one that has never fouled a footpath, crossed the road without looking both ways or killed a defenceless goose - brutally crushed beneath the pedals of a devil-may-care ten-speed racer. Mr Hattersley's assassin, he predicts, will be dressed in "thigh-hugging lycra" or maybe disguised in a bowler hat and pinstripe suit.

Ruthless roadhogs

This horrifying scenario, thank heavens, has not actually come to pass. In fact Mr Hattersley has himself so far escaped any physical encounter with the two-wheeled vandals he so aptly excoriates. This makes his stand all the more admirable: he speaks not just for himself but for all those - the pedestrians, the minicab drivers, the hot-rodders and drivers of 20-tonne articulated trucks - whose peaceful and mutually agreeable enjoyment of our streets is ruined by the ruthless road hogs on their two wheels of steel.

Irritatingly low speed

Mr Hattersley is right to call them homicidal. If the kamikaze cyclists of Constitution Hill have not killed anyone yet it can only be a matter of time. The fact that they themselves form the majority of victims of traffic accidents can be discounted as a cunning ruse to win public sympathy. With the brightly coloured thigh-hugging lycra that Mr Hattersley draws attention to and their irritatingly low speed they distract drivers of motor vehicles, provoking the high stress levels that cause road rage and resultant accidents. The effect of such accidents is to obstruct traffic, causing endless difficulty to our police force, whose job is quite difficult enough without the additional burden of removing the bodies of foolish cyclists crushed by large vehicles.

Tough on cycling, tough on the causes of cycling

And homicidal mania is not all they are guilty of, says Mr Hattersley. "They are worse than homicidal," he says, "they are self-righteous." Indeed, a homicide is a mere pecadillo beside the odious belief of the bicycle maniacs that they are in the right. Being in the right was surely far from Mr Hattersley's own mind when he mounted this forceful yet modest attack. By so incisively isolating the true source of the carnage on our roads Mr Hattersley has surely done a public service. His is the first blast of the hooter against the monstrous regiment of cyclists. But with his instinctive moderation he balks at drawing the obvious conclusion. He does not go far enough. Something must be done. What better way for the government to show they are serious about tackling the transport problem than by nipping this menace in the bud, restoring the ancient compact between men and cars to what it was of old? Tough on cycling and tough on the causes of cycling - that's how it should be. It's simple: cycling must be banned. Cyclists could then be permitted to practice their vice in private. Just don't let them do it in the street and frighten the lorries.