Leaders of the Irish Government are to meet with the Garda Commissioner in order to discuss the safety concerns regarding e-scooters.
Taoiseach Micheál Martin, Minister for Justice, Jim O'Callaghan, and Minister of State for Transport, Sean Canney are to meet with Garda Commissioner, Justin Kelly to discuss this issue. This comes a week after the Taoiseach had said that he was leaning towards an outright ban on e-scooters, which Mr Kelly said he would support.
As it stands, e-scooter users must be at least 16 years of age, and they cannot exceed a design speed of 20km/h on public roads.
This comes after it was recently revealed that six children were placed on life support at Temple Street Children's Hospital over the previous two weeks due to E-scooter related accidents. Doctors have called for more stringent legislation, claiming that the current laws regarding e scooters are failing to protect children. More on this report here.
Ahead of these discussions, Minister Sean Canney said that any measures taken to tackle the issue around e scooters must be effective and clarify to users and Gardaí who to have to enforce the legislation.
Mr Canney said that there are number of options around e scooters, including an outright ban.
"Most important to me is how quickly can we bring it in and how effective it will be... the status quo will not prevail", he told RTÉ Radio.
He went on to say that it is important to take the negative effects of e scooters on people's lives especially children into consideration.
"The Department of Health has completed a report for us that we will hopefully see this morning", he said in the same interview. "The effect that e-scooters are having on people's lives and children, and how many of them end up in hospital and the type of injuries they have, I think that's very important when you're making a decision on what road to pursue - that we have all the facts in front of us".
The minister went on to said any legislation would also need to protect Gardaí who are in pursuit of e scooters or scramblers, and that they are properly trained to deal with this type of pursuit.
"Parents and guardians have a responsibility, and I would tell them that if you want your child to enjoy their summer, the last thing you should allow them to do is go on an e-scooter", he said. "You just need to look at the facts and figures from CHI in relation to the number of children who are in hospital as a result of e-scooter injuries, particularly those with head injuries" (quotes according to RTÉ Radio).
News of this comes after Amazon removed e scooters from its Irish platform, after it was found that they had not met with Irish legal requirements. More on this story here.
