NSW Premier, Gladys Berejiklian, got a lot of us pretty frothy yesterday with her comment on 2GB radio that, “[The police] haven’t booked anybody for riding a motorbike, because that is akin to riding an exercise bike.”
It seemed the Premier was giving riders the green light to go forth and twist the throttle in the spirit of excercise.
But, alas as we have come to expect in these troubled times, it’s not that simple. Riders indeed have been booked in NSW and nobody wants that $1000 fine to make a shitty situation worse.
So this morning in an effort to get some clarification, we contacted the police – the guys that do the booking. We asked if Gladys was correct and if using excercise and a reason for riding was sufficient enough to avoid a fine for unnecessary travel. We also asked if it was OK to transport a bike to a legal track or trail. This was thier reply:
Given your inquiry is regarding the premier’s comments, best if you direct your questions to the premier’s office.
As far as we are aware, presently no PINS have issued for riding a motorbike without a reasonable excuse.
Regards,
Media Unit
NSW Police Force
OK – so that’s a start, but what’s a reasonable excuse we asked again? Is getting exercise a reasonable excuse as the Premier intimated?
While we enforce the restrictions, what is deemed reasonable is at the discretion of officers at the time.
Any questions regarding the clarification of the premier’s comments should be directed to their office.Regards,
Media Unit
NSW Police Force
“…what is deemed reasonable is at the discretion of officers at the time.”
That doesn’t fill us with confidence that Gladys was correct and it seems any non-essential travel as deemed so by an officer of the law, is still off limits. But perhaps Queensland can lead us out of this.
What we do know is that rules about riding in Queensland are being relaxed and in fact from May 2 you can go for a ride on a bike for pleasure. That’s friggin’ amazeballs news.
We get the feeling NSW and perhaps Victoria isn’t too far behind on this one, which will make us happier than a puppy with two peckers.
WA and SA are both gradually relaxing restrictions too so there is a light at the end of the no-moto tunnel and we feel we’re damn near out of this. Just don’t eat any more bats yeah?
We have reached out to a few more governmental sources to seek further clarification and will update as information comes in so stay tuned.
