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Commons Bill [HL]

I must seriously disagree with the noble Earl about what would happen if a commons association, properly formed, set down rules. Most of what we call the cowboy bikes come from their neighbours. They do not come from Birmingham, they come up from Llandrindod Wells. If the commoners set out to monitor that, that will have an enormous effect. I disagree: it is not a police problem in our part of the country; it is a neighbourhood problem. I am sorry to expand on this, but we had a lot of problems in Gilwern Hill with bikers coming up from Birmingham. It was a marvellous drive across big country for them. I took the initiative and got in touch with the mid-Wales bikers’ association, or whatever, and said, ““Look, if you go on like this, I will have to get the police, at enormous expense, to monitor it””. Mr Parker, who was then the secretary of the mid-Wales bikers Association said, ““Leave it with me””, and we have not had a bike on the common for the past 10 years. So monitoring by those involved, rather than police action, is the right way forward.