Belgian Mobility Minister Jean-Luc Crucke (Francophone centrist Les Engagés) wants to make helmets for anyone riding an electric scooter that reaches speeds of over 20 kilometres per hour compulsory from September, Francophone daily La Libre reports. Minister Crucke has meanwhile confirmed the news. ‘There are too many accidents, often serious ones,’ he says.
Minister Crucke has been working on making the helmet compulsory for e-scooters for some time. He has now set a deadline of September.
Crucke is drafting secondary legislation to introduce the new rule. ‘The situation is now too dangerous, both for riders and for other road users,’ says the Mobility Minister. ‘There are often serious accidents, sometimes even fatal. So we have to respond.’
Distinction between privately-owned and share scooters?
The measure is primarily aimed at privately-owned scooters, which typically travel at speeds exceeding 25 kilometres per hour. 'The Royal Decree will stipulate that any scooter capable of travelling faster than 20 kilometres per hour will be subject to the compulsory helmet rule,' explains Stef Willems of the Vias traffic institute.
And what about share scooters? ‘They will have to be limited to a maximum speed of 20 kilometres per hour to avoid that helmet requirement.’
Nevertheless, Willems argues that users of share scooters should also voluntarily wear a helmet. ‘Falls from scooters often follow a similar pattern: people are catapulted over the handlebars and land on their heads.’ Even at lower speeds, this can have serious consequences.
To be clear: this does not refer to the speed a rider is travelling at a given moment, but to the maximum speed the device is technically capable of reaching.
E-scooter accidents in figures
It has long been clear that the number of accidents involving electric scooters has been rising sharply in recent years. This was again the case last year: in the first six months of 2025, there was a 55 per cent increase in accidents compared to the same period the previous year.
The number of fatalities is also on the rise. By November 2025, the death toll stood at 11, compared to 4 for the whole of 2024.
Why is this happening? According to the Vias traffic institute, we are using e-scooters more and more frequently. But there is also the issue of souped-up scooters, which can sometimes reach speeds of up to 70 kilometres per hour. The maximum permitted speed for an electric scooter is 25 kilometres per hour.
What about electric bikes?
If helmets become compulsory for e-scooter riders capable of speeds over 20 kilometres per hour, shouldn’t that measure also apply to people on electric bikes?
Not necessarily, says Vias’s Stef Willems. 'A bicycle is a different category under the Highway Code. We strongly recommend that electric bike riders and all cyclists wear a helmet, but that remains a personal choice'.
‘The stability of a bicycle is also very different from that of a scooter. Then there is the behaviour of the users. With electric scooters, we often see people pushing the speed to the limit. With bicycles, that is less often the case.’