{"id":330100,"date":"2026-03-05T10:22:08","date_gmt":"2026-03-05T10:22:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/330100\/"},"modified":"2026-03-05T10:22:08","modified_gmt":"2026-03-05T10:22:08","slug":"scrambler-ban-regulations-delayed-due-to-competing-interests-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/330100\/","title":{"rendered":"Scrambler ban regulations delayed due to \u2018competing\u2019 interests \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

Regulations to ban scramblers outright in public places were delayed due to \u201ccompeting\u201d interests in the Department of Transport<\/a> across 2\u00bd years, documents show. <\/p>\n

The Government has had the power since 2023 to impose an explicit ban on such vehicles, but it did not move to enact the regulations until shortly after Grace Lynch (16) was fatally injured by a scrambler<\/a> in Finglas, Dublin last January. <\/p>\n

The records show the Garda asked the department \u2013 almost a year before Grace was killed \u2013 about the progress of regulations after it was informed by Fingal County Council that it had passed a motion raising concerns about the number of scrambler incidents in its area. <\/p>\n

T\u00e1naiste Simon Harris<\/a> said at the time of Grace\u2019s death hat he did not have \u201ca satisfactory answer\u201d for why this had not happened and that it was \u201cnot an acceptable situation\u201d. The ban, which is to be signed into law this month, will be known as Grace\u2019s Law. <\/p>\n

\"GraceGrace Lynch was fatally injured in the incident. Photograph: rip.ie <\/p>\n

Minutes and records of eight meetings between An Garda S\u00edoch\u00e1na and the department, released under Freedom of Information law, show the regulations were consistently raised between 2023 and earlier this year. <\/p>\n

The Road Traffic and Roads Act 2023 had given the Minister for Transport power to ban specific vehicles, such as scramblers, from public places. The same law made it an offence to drive an unregistered off-road vehicle such as a scrambler in a public place, to drive any vehicle dangerously in a public place, and gave garda\u00ed the power to seize scrambler bikes. <\/p>\n

Minutes of a November 2023 meeting noted that the scrambler regulations \u201chave been slightly delayed due to competing commitments\u201d. <\/p>\n

The department told The Irish Times \u201cthe competing demands that delayed the making of the regulations\u201d referred to the Road Traffic Act 2024, a separate piece of legislation. <\/p>\n

\u201cThis was emergency legislation brought forward by Minister [Jack] Chambers in response to deteriorating road safety trends at that time and was developed in a rapid manner over a period of months. The Bill was enacted in April 2024, having commenced development in late 2023.\u201d<\/p>\n

But in correspondence between the department and Garda in February 2025, after the Road Traffic Act 2024 was enacted, \u201ccompeting work commitments\u201d were again blamed for the \u201cslow\u201d progress of the scrambler regulations. <\/p>\n

The Garda had written to the department that month seeking an update on the regulations after the Ballymun station was told by Fingal County Council<\/a> it had passed a motion raising a \u201cred alert\u201d about the increasing number of incidents with scramblers in the council area. <\/p>\n

[\u00a0Girl (16) killed in Dublin scrambler incident named as Grace LynchOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

It was noted at a meeting in February 2024 that \u201cmore consultation\u201d was needed on the regulations. It was agreed to start planning the wording of the regulations at a meeting in May 2024. The regulations were again discussed by the department and Garda in June, September and November of last year. <\/p>\n

At a meeting on January 13th last, 12 days before Grace Lynch\u2019s death, the department and Garda again discussed the implementation of the regulations. <\/p>\n

The department said \u201cit is important to be clear that there was no delay in terms of the legal ban on scrambler use in public places\u201d and that scramblers were \u201calready comprehensively illegal aside from appropriate off-road uses\u201d.<\/p>\n

The Garda said it \u201cdoes not comment on or discuss matters concerning pending legislation\u201d. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Regulations to ban scramblers outright in public places were delayed due to \u201ccompeting\u201d interests in the Department of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":330101,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[45,7941,12845,61,60,43,70],"class_list":["post-330100","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ireland","tag-an-garda-siochana","tag-department-of-transport","tag-fingal-county-council","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-news","tag-simon-harris"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/330100","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=330100"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/330100\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/330101"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=330100"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=330100"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=330100"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}