Good Evening

Good evening,

On Friday Evening an alarming number of teenagers descended on Chatham high street causing mass antisocial behaviour. The patrol inspector was quick to act by putting on a section 34 dispersal order allowing us to disperse anyone causing or believed to be causing antisocial behaviour from the area. 

Medway PCSO’s stayed in the high street for over an hour continuing to disperse groups. The final group tried riding an E scooter around PCSO’s.

Fortunately, the section 34 allows us extra powers to seize any item being used in antisocial behaviour. The E Scooter seizure was conducted by me and, new to the department, PCSO Ahmed. 

E Scooters are something we are asked about daily by a lot of people, and we have conducted operations over the last few months in the high street targeting E scooters alone. We have seized dozens and dozens, but it seems like a drop in the ocean sometimes. 

I will explain the legal standpoint. E scooters are classed as mechanically propelled vehicles and so they are governed under the same laws as cars and motorbikes. No exemptions.

Ryders need, 

A licence - (can be a provisional with L plates on your scooter.) so you need to be at least 16 years old.

Insurance is required - (but not possible to insure on the roads at the moment.)

Tax - E-scooters do not need to be registered, display registration plates or pay vehicle excise duty.

Technically everyone riding an e scooter should be stopped and the scooter seized for having no insurance and crushed.

E scooters can be ridden on private land with landowners’ permission. 

Retailers of E scooters are required to explain the law when E-scooters are being sold and customers are supposed to sign paperwork to acknowledge this.

Kent police have been into schools, before Christmas, and really pushed for parents not to buy their children E scooters for the last 4 years. 

We have improved our approach but there is a lot more room for improvement. We currently focus on key built up areas where the risk to pedestrians is greater or on E scooters being ridden in a dangerous antisocial manner (like the example above)

If you do ride an E scooter do not be surprised if you are stopped and it is taken in the near future. 

Policing should always be proportional to the crime.

If the public want a more robust e scooter approach, then reports of E scooters need to increase and it would be beneficial to complain to local councillors. 

Legislation in UK parliament is changing. This issue of a lack of legislation was raised in November 2024 and I have not seen anything further. It would be beneficial if parliament gave law enforcement and the public clear guidance about what is acceptable in relation to this ongoing problem. 

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