Rider insurance (or lack thereof)

[Whitelinehugger]

On 4/21/2026 at 10:35 PM, Fromafar said:

Until you tell them you ride a Speedway bike.!!

With no brakes

[Whitelinehugger]

17 hours ago, mikebv said:

Oh Good!!!

Now. Which Popcorn to have?

Decisions. Decisions...

Make mine toffee flavour please

[Whitelinehugger]

14 hours ago, IainB said:

Sounds like a Trump ultimatum 😂

Does Barker Always Chicken Out? 🤔

He’s got loads of eggs to prove he dont

[M.D]

From Ben Barker

 

Firstly, I want to make it absolutely clear that I have no problem with the Speedway Control Bureau and Auto Cycle Union. They have done nothing untoward.

In the close season, the riders were told they had to pay an extra £28 for their ACU licence. That was, we were told, to cover for an extra insurance policy.

From the research I have done, this is what I believe has happened. When that was suggested by the ACU, BSPL chairman Rob Godfrey decided the riders don’t need to be insured by the clubs. Therefore it saved the clubs a load of money per season. I’m not sure of the exact amount, but around £4,000 per club.

When this issue was first raised by me at Poole on Good Friday, Mr Godfrey stated in Speedway Star on April 11 that “Ben Barker has caused a panic for nothing. The insurance policy has not been withdrawn, it has been replaced”.

Subsequently, it’s been clear that ACU insurance was inferior to the old Race Insurance. This had led to the clubs covering their own riders to quell any fears, Ipswich and Redcar have announced this publicly, while a couple of other clubs have done so privately.

Just over a week ago, the BSPL issued a new insurance policy which is inferior to the previous Race Insurance we had with the BSPL.

The old cover for an injured rider was £225 a week, 14-day excess period and up to 52 weeks of payments.

The new cover is now £150 a week, 14-day excess period and only up to 26 weeks of payments. It is nowhere near good enough to what we had previously.

But it was a clear admission of wrongdoing by the BSPL that they had to re-issue a new insurance despite claiming I had caused “panic for nothing”. That wasn’t true.

There has been no apology or explanation to how the season was started with riders not having appropriate insurance.

Four riders were injured during that period; Niels-Kristian Iversen, Charles Wright, Tobias Thomsen and Vinnie Foord.

That is clear negligence from the BSPL. That needs to be explained and who made those decisions which have cost the injured riders dearly.

We need transparency about the people who made the decisions and whether we need changes in the people running the BSPL. Someone has to take responsibility for the mistakes that have been made.

This is such a serious issue. The riders’ welfare has been overlooked in a terrible way.

There are even more serious issues regarding this insurance issue. I will go into them at a later point.

If it get 1000 likes 500 shares ill give a £50 voucher of the winners choice

[IainB]

He's only gone and bloody done it... and well done to him for speaking out... he's not telling us anything we don't already know that the BSPL chairman is rotten to the core (Quelle surprise) and desperately needs replacing, it's just a shame that it's taken this to get any rider to speak out about it... and the mind boggles as to the other goings on that we have never heard about... the BSPL makes Fifa look like the Salvation Army!

[mikebv]

25 minutes ago, IainB said:

He's only gone and bloody done it... and well done to him for speaking out... he's not telling us anything we don't already know that the BSPL chairman is rotten to the core (Quelle surprise) and desperately needs replacing, it's just a shame that it's taken this to get any rider to speak out about it... and the mind boggles as to the other goings on that we have never heard about... the BSPL makes Fifa look like the Salvation Army!

In any normal business such a "s**t show" would see the person in charge/therefore responsible, being removed from their post wouldn't it?...

It is UK Speedway though...

[IainB]

10 minutes ago, mikebv said:

In any normal business such a "s**t show" would see the person in charge/therefore responsible, being removed from their post wouldn't it?...

It is UK Speedway though...

Seems to be a job for life and and the only way out is to retire. A normal organisation would have had a vote of confidence years ago. 

[IainB]

... maybe this is one of the "wow!" news stories Rob Godfrey was teasing us with a few weeks back 🤔

[Sir Sidney]

There are many parts of this that need to be fully clarified. I don't see how the Chairman of an organisation that has led this can survive.

Firstly, what is actually in riders contracts this year and how does it compare to previous years?

Secondly, who is actually saving the money? I believe Ben Barker had previously said that riders had £5 per race deducted to cover insurance. If that was the case, and that is not happening, then surely it is the riders and not the clubs making a saving. If the riders were aware then they could have used this to take out their own personal accident insurance, as some have published that they have done. Whether that is comparable is another matter. 

If the clubs were paying the insurance previously, and now are not and are making a saving, then surely they are complicit in this - even more so if they didn't explain this to their riders. If clubs either took out insurance to the same value, or advised their riders of the change - allowing riders to negotiate a contract so that they were no worse off, then the club may be exonerated. 

It remains a completely unedifying, and very seriously situation 

Edited 42 minutes ago by Sir Sidney