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@cycling
tl;dr: A police officer today stopped me and told me he didn't want to see me cycling with my child again.
I am a university student. I cycle into college five (or more) days each week. The journey is about 3.6miles.
On my way to/from university, I have to drop off/pick up my two-year-old daughter. The distance from our child minder to our house is a mere 0.8miles. We both wear helmets (EN1078 compliant) and her childseat is a fairly standard rear-mounted recliner, which is compliant with EN14344. I always make sure that I cycle down a route with very few right-turns. Just one right turn is needed on the way. I don't go through red lights, etc, etc.
I travel with a rucksack containing my laptop and bike-fixing equipment (there is plenty of clearance between the bag and child) and for the 0.8mile journey I also carry an over-the-shoulder changing bag (like this). Given today's hot weather, I'd responsibly covered her in suncream and taken a sunhat, which I attached to the back of her bike seat with elastic bands.
This morning (at approximately 10:20) I was cycling in a cycle lane about 100 yards from my destination. A 4x4 police traffic car was crawling alongside. I believed he was trying to pass, and continued in the cycle lane (pretty much gutter cycling) and slowed down. He then started beeping, and I turned to see the officer driving pointing towards the pavement. I pulled over and he overtook and came to a halt... at first I was wondering if I had done something stupid, like hadn't given way when turning left at the mini-roundabout or gone through a zebra crossing.
The officer asked where I was going. I told him. He said that I was putting my daughter's life "at risk" and that he didn't want to see me cycling with her again. He told me that I was "carrying too much weight" on the bike, presumably due to the rucksack and changing bag (although I presume that her little sunhat strapped to the back drew attention and made the bike look overladen). He also said that I "didn't know what was going on" around me, backing this claim up by the difficulty he had in stopping me (due to the fact I thought he was trying to overtake). He also said that the seat (safety standard compliant and fitted securely) was bouncing around.
He concluded by telling me that I should proceed on foot to my destination, that he didn't mind if I wanted to put my life at risk but not my daughter's and made some threat about what he would do if he caught me cycling with her again - although I missed the end of his sentence as he started to mumble a bit, possibly because he didn't have much in mind. I've since found an article on The Telegraph website about a father who was fined for carrying a child on a bike last year, despite the seat being approved to British safety standards and correctly fitted.
I'm not entirely sure what to do now. I didn't get any of his details, and nor was I in the mood to have any kind of confrontation with him. Surely this kind of "advice" goes against the current drive to get families out of cars and onto bikes?