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UNCORRECTED TRANSCRIPT OF ORAL EVIDENCE To be published as HC 748-ii House of COMMONS MINUTES OF EVIDENCE TAKEN BEFORE TRANSPORT committee
FINDING A SPACE FOR PARKING POLICY
Wednesday 14 December 2005 MR EDMUND KING, MR PAUL WATTERS MR CHRIS WELSH and MR MIKE BRACEY
MS CAROLINE SHEPPARD and MR MARTIN WOOD MS KAREN BUCK MP and MR MIKE TALBOT Evidence heard in Public Questions 212 - 420
USE OF THE TRANSCRIPT
Oral Evidence Taken before the Transport Committee on Wednesday 14 December 2005 Members present Mrs Gwyneth Dunwoody, in the Chair Mr Jeffrey M Donaldson Clive Efford Mrs Louise Ellman Mr Robert Goodwill Mr Eric Martlew Mr Lee Scott Graham Stringer ________________ Memoranda submitted by RAC Foundation, AA Motoring Trust Freight Transport Association and Brewery Logistics Group
Examination of Witnesses
Witnesses: Mr Edmund King, Executive Director, RAC Foundation; Mr Paul Watters, Head of Roads and Transport Policy, AA Motoring Trust; Mr Chris Welsh, General Manager, Campaigns, Freight Transport Association; and Mr Mike Bracey, Chairman, Brewery Logistics Group, gave evidence. Chairman: Members who have an interest to declare, Mr Martlew? Mr Martlew: A member of the Transport and General Municipal Workers Union. Clive Efford: A member of the Transport and General Workers Union. Chairman: Gwyneth Dunwoody, a member of Aslef. Mrs Ellman: A member of the Transport and General Workers Union. Mr Goodwill: A member of Aslef. Graham Stringer: A member of Amicus. Q212 Chairman: Good afternoon, gentlemen. Would you please identify yourselves? Mr King: Edmund King, Executive Director of the RAC Foundation. Mr Watters: Paul Watters, Head of Roads and Transport Policy for the AA Motoring Trust. Mr Welsh: Chris Welsh, General Manager of Campaigns, Freight Transport Association. Mr Bracey: Mike Bracey, Chairman of the Brewery Logistics Group. Q213 Chairman: Did anyone have anything they wanted to say briefly before we begin? Mr King: Firstly, could I say that we are delighted that the Committee is addressing this subject. We published a report Parking and Transport Policy last year and, by doing work into that, we have found that parking was perhaps one of the least well-researched, the least well-understood areas of transport policy and yet it is essential. You only use a car to go from A to B, but if you cannot park at B, your journey is useless; it is almost like having a train that does not stop at the platform. It is a big problem and there are problems with on-street parking, including supply and demand. There has been a 10 per cent reduction in car park spaces in the centre of London recently. There is a lack of clarity over signs and this is a major problem. I would just refer to a sign in Bromley that has five different changes of time and, to be frank, I cannot understand it. There are numerous examples of signs, one of which says, "Please remember you must display your ticket during the free initial 30-minute parking period", and you need a PhD in parking to actually understand a lot of this. There are also inappropriate restrictions, restrictions that were put on the roads for historic reasons and then the change of use of the building has changed, and we also have seen some over-zealous enforcement. There are two other problems that I would urge the Committee to consider with regard to parking on private land and one is still the continuing problem with wheel-clamping on private land, despite the 2001 Private Securities Act which was meant to regulate wheel-clampers and we have still got clampers getting away with daylight robbery. They are getting a licence, but they are charging £525 to clamp and tow away, so in effect the Home Office licence is a licence to print money and it is really not working. The second area there is that some clampers who have had difficulties getting licences from the Security Industry Authority are now using closed-circuit TV to get car numbers in car parks. They are then contacting the DVLA and paying £2.50 to get the owner's details and they are then getting money from motorists in that way, and we are very concerned that DVLA are giving some of this information to organisations that perhaps they should not. The winner of the Foundation's infamous Dick Turpin Award for the UK's worst wheel-clamper is a recipient of that information. I would just say, Madam Chairman, that many motorists would be delighted if your Committee's remit could also look at those two areas. Q214 Chairman: Thank you very much. I think some of them will come in during the questioning. Can I ask you if you agree with the 75 per cent of people who think that enforcement in London is really too lenient? Mr King: Well, I think it is difficult to talk for London as a whole because it does vary from borough to borough and different boroughs have very different parking regimes. Westminster has improved considerably probably over the last 12 months, whereas initially with decriminalised parking, it was probably one of the worst, so I think there are great variations across London and I think that is part of the problem for the motorist, that they do not always know how the rules will be interpreted in the boroughs. Q215 Chairman: Mr Watters, do we need more enforcement? Mr Watters: There is no reason to have more enforcement so long as it is fair and drivers understand why it is needed. I think the problem is that it is regarded as a revenue-collection exercise rather than to deter people from parking. I think it is better to deter than actually to penalise, but deterrence now seems to have gone out of the window and it is sort of revenue-generation, the more tickets the better. The presence of attendants on the street should actually act to prevent people from parking illegally. Measures are there, parking regulation is there to make the streets safer and make traffic flow more smoothly. The problems we found when decriminalised parking started in London, we did a survey in 1994 which showed that authorities that were undertaking these new powers and the power to collect the revenue had not, as they promised, reviewed their regulations and in fact, as it turned out, many tickets that were issued in the early days were completely unfounded because the orders were not in order, as it were, the signs did not match up to the lines and these things were not legally enforceable. Q216 Chairman: Have you got any more recent evidence than that because 1994 is quite a time ago? Mr Watters: I think the best evidence now is that the Adjudicator's annual reports show that in a number of cases, when they go to a formal appeal, often the mitigating circumstances are that the orders do not stack up. Q217 Chairman: Yes, but not entirely. I do not think one should read too much into that. Mr Welsh, what about freight? Mr Welsh: Freight has suffered a particular problem since decriminalisation. Parking notices or penalty charge notices have gone up by 75 per cent in London. Q218 Chairman: Since when? Mr Welsh: Since the introduction of the decriminalisation. The problem that the freight industry has got is that a lack of loading and unloading provisions has meant that it has got very little alternative other than to deliver in the way that it does and, therefore, in order just to do normal business, it has suffered a tremendous penalty. Individual companies are paying tens of thousands of pounds ---- Q219 Chairman: Have you got specific evidence on that? Mr Welsh: We have, Madam Chairman, from our individual member companies who have provided this information through surveys that we have undertaken and a number of our members are also the major brewery companies, and I think Mike Bracey might have some specific evidence. Q220 Chairman: I was going to ask Mr Bracey about that. Tell me about the specific problems for breweries. Mr Bracey: Well, the brewery problem obviously very simply is health and safety. We must park outside the entrance to the pub. We cannot park across the road and we cannot park down the road because we cannot wheel kegs or push kegs across a road or push them up the road. Do not forget, a 22-gallon keg weighs 123 kilograms and, therefore, we have got to park adjacent to the actual entrance. Now, if, for example, it is on this side of the road and there is a double-yellow line with double blips and the parking is on the other side, we cannot do it. We cannot do it. We have got to park adjacent or else who is going to take responsibility for the accidents that will occur when you are rolling the containers? It is a very serious problem and it is costing my members at the present moment £700,000 a year. Q221 Chairman: What have you done about that? Mr Bracey: Well, we have had a very, very good session with Westminster. When I got involved in this in April 2004, they issued my members with 872 PCNs in April 2004. I started talking to Kevin Goad and other people within Westminster Council and we worked very hard, both sides. The brewers have looked at their delivery windows and they have looked at where they can change deliveries from, say, 12 o'clock to eight o'clock. The other thing you have got to bear in mind with the brewers again is the noise. We cannot just go at six o'clock in the morning and start delivering kegs because of again the noise factor with neighbours around the area, so we have that factor as well to consider, so really our delivery window becomes very narrow and obviously it is a time when no one wants to see us on the roads. Q222 Chairman: Are you all suggesting in effect that raising revenue through parking enforcement has influenced local authority parking strategies? Mr Watters: I think without doubt. I think that when the new regime started, there was an emphasis on ticket issue. Authorities were enforcing, for example, footway parking bans in the middle of the night in some boroughs of London because the tickets were there for the having, as it were, and the fact that the cars were on pavements to let emergency vehicles through was sensible in terms of local environment, but ---- Q223 Chairman: Yes, but if you are going to have a medical emergency, it does not always happen nine to five, I am afraid. Mr Watters: No, and I think that when it first started, it hit people like a tonne of bricks and I think it could have been introduced in a much more gradual way and really have started to get the culture right in communities about the parking rules. Q224 Chairman: You mean how to love your parking attendant? Mr Watters: Well, it is hardly that at the moment and I think it is the revenue that has lost the argument with the public. That is the concern. Q225 Chairman: Let's be quite clear about it. That was immediate, but are you saying it is still the same or are you saying it is better or are you saying there is a modus vivendi which has been worked out between the motorists and the authorities? Mr Watters: I think it is getting better, but it is from a very low base and an awful lot more needs to be done. Q226 Mr Scott: What in particular would you like to see improved through statutory guidance? Mr Welsh: We are very clear on that. The Department for Transport at the moment is undertaking a review of the decriminalisation with a view to spreading that out right across the country. What we are asking the Department to do is issue specific guidance to local authorities on how they should apply the parking regime. Alongside that, we would also ask them to ensure that local authorities undertake a review of loading and unloading facilities so that industry is able to deliver to the high street. Q227 Mr Scott: Mr Bracey, what measures would you like to help breweries and the logistics of vehicles delivering? You mentioned further problems, but what would you suggest to solve them? Mr Bracey: I think, if I am pragmatic about this and really honest, looking at an example we have had with Westminster, the brewers themselves have worked very hard, as I said, changed their delivery windows, but there is a lot more to it. Obviously you have got to get people to open the pubs up and again in the Soho area where they work until three o'clock in the morning, they do not necessarily want to be up at six, seven or eight o'clock even to let you in, they do not want to come until 12 o'clock, so we have worked very hard at looking at the actual windows there. We have worked very hard with Westminster and they have changed parking restrictions for us to let us park adjacent to the buildings, but I think, if I am pragmatic, there is going to be a point where it is as far as anybody can go, as far as we are concerned. I do not expect miracles; we will not be able to park legally outside every single pub. One thing I would ask though, which I am very concerned about, is that the banks and buildings which are being converted now from what they were to pubs, no one, when they are giving planning permission, ever looks at whether you can park outside and I think that is critical. I have been to some of the conversions in London and dangerous is not the word for it. It is ludicrous and I honestly believe that when planning permission is being given, parking outside and delivery facilities should be on top of the list. Q228 Chairman: Alternatively, don't let anybody drink beer! Mr Bracey: No, I think not. I was not actually suggesting that. I think we keep London quite well stocked up with beer for the tourists and the workers. Seriously, some of the conversions, if you go out and see them, and I could take you round and show you, they are frightening, and that is a key point. There is going to be a point, and I do not know the answer, to be honest with you, but we will have to park where we should not park or we will not deliver and then you do get the point you have just made, that pubs will not get beer. Q229 Mr Scott: I do not think anyone is suggesting we do not have beer in pubs! Mr Watters? Mr Watters: I think the statutory guidance is the best opportunity for ten years to actually restore public confidence in the new decriminalised parking regime, but I think it has got to promise things like targeting the system at evaders because there is nothing worse than someone on a meter getting clobbered and the person next to it not being clobbered, yet they have got ten unpaid tickets. I think we have been pressing for a decade in London to have a persistent offender database so that ordinary motorists who may fall foul once see that the hard offender is getting dealt with more harshly. Perhaps we even need to look at sort of variable-offence penalty levels so that it matches the crime, as it were. To be a few minutes over and get a £100 PCN is quite tough. Under the old system, we did have the excess charge and then a penalty, so there are advantages, and I think the guidance will restore confidence, providing also that the signs and lines match the restriction. There seems to be very little checking before we have the ticket issued and often the ticket does not stack up. Mr King: I think the guidance should also look at some of the back-office functions and not just the front office and the attendants because when parking complaints actually get through to the appeal process, the final stage, 27 per cent of those are uncontested by the local authority and in some local authorities, for instance, in Birmingham 59 per cent are uncontested and where I live in St Albans, 67 per cent are uncontested. Now, that suggests that the local authority has allowed the complaint, has not really looked at the complaint, has waited until the final moment and then rejected it, but in the meantime the motorist has had to go through that process. I think that is where motorists feel that the whole system lets them down and I think if local authorities were instructed to look at complaints in more detail through the guidance at an earlier stage, I certainly think that would help. Q230 Mrs Ellman: Mr King, just following that point up, who do you think should be responsible for motorists getting better information about how to make representations? Mr King: Well, I think information is actually crucial throughout this whole subject and part of the problem is the lack of clarity, the lack of plain English from the signing all the way through to even what is on the back of the parking ticket. Once the motorist gets to the final appeals process, I actually think that works very well, but there are a lot of cases that should not get there and I think the local authority should make it much easier, that if someone has got a complaint, and I did one on Radio Norfolk yesterday, a lady tourist who had bought a pay-and-display ticket, put it on the window, there was probably condensation on the window, it dropped into the footwell of the car, she got a fine, she tried to chase it up and in the end she paid the fine because she was worried about it going further. Now, commonsense should be applied. She had a ticket, she had purchased the ticket. If she has purchased the ticket, she is not defrauding the system. There are too many cases like that, so I think we need more clarity and simple guidelines. Mr Welsh: That has been a very serious issue for us both in London and throughout the rest of the country and we have worked very, very closely with other industry groups, like the Brewery Logistics Group, CBI and other business interests, along with the principal London boroughs that we have had the major problem with, firstly, to get a clear understanding of the definition of the rules and, secondly, importantly to provide best practice advice. We have now come to a common agreement with the ALG and a number of the individual boroughs to produce a joint voluntary code of best practice which will give appropriate advice both to our members, but also to the parking attendants and the contractors of the parking attendants and really the code is calling for a harmonised review right across the capital. At the moment each individual borough has a different definition, has a different appeals process, that type of thing, and we want obviously to reach a harmonised regime. We very much hope that that can be adopted within the statutory guidelines which can then be spread out across the country because obviously our members are operating not only in the individual London boroughs, but right across the country and it is very difficult to give advice to drivers and delivery staff about the regimes unless we have that common approach. Q231 Mrs Ellman: Should local authorities have to produce annual information about the number of penalty charge notices issued and what has happened to them? Mr Watters: I think this is essential really, an annual report with the number of penalties that were issued and also sort of performance leagues in terms of improvements. We hear of CCTV enforcement in some London streets resulting in a huge number of PCNs and I actually question whether that is too remote because it is actually doing nothing to change the situation on the ground. Surely, if you do not want the offences to take place, you have to adopt measures in that street to prevent people from parking illegally, whether that means a person patrolling, but to actually remotely issue PCNs does not really seem to be giving the driver much information. I know the driver should not park illegally, but it seems to be sort of a headcount rather than ---- Q232 Chairman: I just want to be clear, Mr Watters. When I asked you earlier on, "Do you think there is not enough enforcement? Do you think it should be more strongly enforced?", I got the impression you were saying no. Now you appear to be saying, "except in those areas where people are parking illegally". Mr Watters: Well, it is enforcement and deterrence. I think it has to go hand in hand, the enforcement and the deterrence. Q233 Chairman: I just want to be clear. You are saying that yes, there is a real case for better and stronger enforcement? Mr Watters: Yes, and I think in our surveys we have some evidence that that is supported, but it is a question of firm and fair and I think the fairness element is not understood by the public at the moment. Q234 Mrs Ellman: In the RAC Foundation's evidence, you have said that Manchester City Council's parking regime was "reasonable and proportional", but does that mean that they are not enforcing it as heavily? Mr King: No, not at all. What it actually means is that they have changed their contracts and the way they apply them. Initially the contracts had figures in them of expected numbers of tickets and I think that led to abuses of the system. There was perhaps over-zealous enforcement. What they are now trying to do is look at general compliance, so looking at one stretch of road and actually ascertaining how many illegal parking acts there are there. You do not always have to give out thousands of tickets to get good compliance. You can have attendants there, you can have attendants talking, and also things like in Manchester where they stopped wheel-clamping for people overstaying on a meter, and that is sensible. What is the purpose of wheel-clamping if it is overstaying? All you are doing is prolonging, if you like, the crime. There is no purpose at all. You may wish to charge a higher amount for the fine, but there is certainly no purpose. I think Manchester realised that doing it the first way, they were so inundated with complaints, as were other areas, like Westminster, that they have looked at their contracts again. The British Parking Association offers a model contract that is more on general compliance and I think that is the way ahead and hopefully, and I know you took evidence from Andy Vaughan from Manchester last week, but hopefully other local authorities will look to the best practice that is happening there. It is certainly a more harmonious regime. They receive less revenue, but there is less conflict. Q235 Mrs Ellman: Are there any other local authorities that should be commended? What about the Freight Transport Association - are there any authorities that you know of? Mr Welsh: Well, we do not actually detect much of a problem throughout the rest of the UK. The over-zealous enforcement and the real problem we have had is in London, but we are conscious of the fact that decriminalisation is now going to be rolled out across the country and we do not want any copycat-type tactics where clearly many of the local authorities in London seem to have been using the issuing of parking notices as a milch-cow, to be perfectly honest, and that would clearly be unacceptable, particularly as these businesses are really just carrying out their daily business in trying to deliver to high street retail premises and other business premises. Q236 Mrs Ellman: Should local authorities have penalties imposed on them for incorrectly issuing notices or behaving unreasonably? Mr Watters: From the letters I receive, people spend an enormous amount of time sometimes protesting their innocence and it probably does cost them quite a lot, but there is no standard sort of compensation for the time and effort they have put in. It is interesting to note that adjudicators are now beginning actually to pay compensation more widely than they used to and I think that is indicative perhaps of a problem of people being messed around, as it were, by the paperwork. I think the back office does have a lot to answer for in some of the poor image that some authorities are portraying in their parking service, so certainly compensation is something that should be looked at, perhaps a standard fee equal to the cost of the penalty if you win. Why not? Why should you not get as much as they are threatening to take from you if they are wrong? Q237 Mrs Ellman: So penalties and compensation? Mr Watters: Or just compensation. Mr Welsh: I think we would really just require a harmonised and proper appeals procedure for dealing with this because at the moment many appealers on the industry side are required to submit their appeals within a very tight window of 14 days and often they have not got all the paperwork to be able to do that properly, whereas in order to get a response from the boroughs, it can be months and months before they actually get any response. Therefore, in terms of the service that is being provided here, we would like to see a statutory guidance giving good indications to local authorities that they must respond within a certain period, whether it be 21 days or 28 days, because if we do not have that, then it is a disincentive for a business that legitimately feels they have been unfairly issued with a penalty notice actually to do anything about it and it is not worth appealing because of the process. Q238 Mrs Ellman: What about a notice naming and shaming authorities who take too long to deal with representations or act wrongly in too many cases? Mr Welsh: I think that what we would like, and it hinges on one of the other questions which was asked earlier, is some sort of service-level agreement with the boroughs where certain standards are set and once you have got that service-level agreement, you can compare one borough against another or one authority against another in terms of how it deals with this. Mr Watters: I think the Transport Research Laboratory was looking at a way of benchmarking authorities because, by using the adjudicator statistics, it gives you a very limited picture of how authorities are actually performing because only a very small percentage of appeals go to the official adjudicator and the majority of representations are made at the early stage to the council and the outcomes of those are very rarely known, so we do not get the full picture from the national adjudicators. Q239 Mrs Ellman: What more should be done to make sure that local authorities inform people adequately about the procedures for representation? I mentioned this earlier and I would like to know. Mr Watters: I think they should produce the annual report and I think they should show how they are achieving better compliance. Q240 Chairman: I think Mrs Ellman is asking you something slightly different. How does the average motorist know exactly what will happen there? Are they adequately informed of what the powers and the involvement of the adjudicator will be? Mr King: I would say that they are not and I would say that the system puts them off because when you receive a parking ticket, it says if you pay within 14 days, you can have a 50 per cent discount. If you go through to appeal and you lose your appeal, you can no longer have that discount. We do get a lot of people phoning us up who are actually worried because they are on low incomes and they do not want to miss that opportunity of the 50 per cent discount even though they feel that they have been judged unfairly, so simplifying those procedures, simplifying the way that the appeals are spelled out on the back of the ticket, simplifying what it actually says on the signs so they do not get a ticket in the first place, I think all of that would certainly help. Q241 Mrs Ellman: Does that need to be in statutory guidance? Mr Watters: I think best practice should be that you should be entitled to the discount if your initial representation to the local authority fails. At the moment some grant it, some do not, which seems very unfair to the motorist. Mr Bracey: I think one of the examples of this is the voluntary appeal versus the notice-to-owner appeal, and this has already been mentioned. In actual fact, I was at a meeting in Westminster yesterday with a colleague from a frozen food company, it was the first time he had been to the meeting, and he actually said, "Well, I don't like to appeal because I have got to wait for the notice to owner", and I said, "You haven't". What happened in Westminster in February, without telling anybody, they reversed the information on the back. They always used to have a voluntary appeal first and the notice to owner as the fall-back. In February, without telling anybody, or they did not tell us obviously and I just happened to look at a PCN in March, they had actually reversed it, so anybody who picks it up, as my colleague says, they look at it, they think they have got to wait for the notice to owner to appear before they can appeal and, on that strength, they have then lost that £50 ---- Q242 Chairman: It is a bit hard, Mr Bracey, to expect local authorities to deal with people who do not read, is it not? Mr Bracey: No, sorry, it is a sequence. It comes in a sequence. If you pick any document up, it does not say, "You do this first", or you do it second, it is just listed first and second and, therefore, the ordinary motorist and even in our industry, if they look at it, they imagine they have got to wait for the NTO to come, the notice to owner, which comes after 28 days normally when they have not paid. It is just the way it is designed and I think again, as my colleague has said, we want standard information on the back which is very, very clear. Q243 Clive Efford: Just following on from some of those questions, Mr Bracey and Mr King, you have both held up Westminster as being one of the worst examples, but an example of one authority that has improved its act. Are you confident that the statutory guidance or any other measures that are being put in place will prevent another authority, or even Westminster slipping back, becoming another Westminster? Mr King: I am not confident as it currently stands and I think that is why the guidance really needs to be tightened up. A lot of it is down to the actual contracts and when the local authority goes to the parking manager and says, "How much revenue do you expect you will get this year from your tickets?", they do various assessments. Even if they are not direct targets, they are seen as estimates and people work towards those numbers and that somehow puts pressure on the system to produce more tickets than a fairer system would, so yes, it could happen elsewhere if the whole guidance is not tightened up. Mr Bracey: There is a borough that is actually doing that and that is Camden. Camden have increased quite considerably over the last 18 months, as far as my members are concerned. In fact they are up by 78 per cent in 17 months. They are now becoming leading second contender for the worst borough. Q244 Clive Efford: You may want to comment on this, but I take it from your answer just then, Mr King, that you believe this, that you suspect or you know that local authorities are driven by the need to raise revenue because of figures that they put in their budgets in the financial year. Mr King: There is no doubt that that has been an influence. I have been in meetings with local authorities and parking contractors after London Congestion Charging came into place and there was a fear voiced that Congestion Charging would reduce the number of cars coming into London and, hence, would reduce the revenue. That was a fear raised, so that indicated ----- Q245 Chairman: By the contractor or by the local authority? Mr King: Well, they seem to be pretty close together in their thinking on that. Q246 Chairman: Well, it is important to know, Mr King. Mr King: But it was a discussion of the two. Then other local authorities have had ticket targets at certain times and, depending on how many tickets you give out, you can win a flat-screen TV, et cetera, and we felt that those kind of incentive schemes led to abuse and the fact that an attendant would be waiting in a doorway, putting a ticket on a car the minute before because he needed to fulfil his quota. One of the problems is motivating parking attendants and one of the problems is that I think they are pretty poorly paid, so if the levels of pay and training were increased, you would not need such schemes. Now, most local authorities since these schemes have been exposed, and there is another one with Argos points or something, though I do not think that is quite as popular, but they are saying that they are discontinuing these. Mr Watters: I was just going to pick up on the point you made about the guidance, that authorities do not toe the line. There is always the possibility of special parking area status being withdrawn from an authority if it does not toe the line. Looking to the Traffic Management Act, which can require a local authority to have a traffic director imposed, there could be a reason why a special parking area could not have its status withdrawn if it failed to perform or performed very badly or illegally. Q247 Chairman: Have you any evidence of that? Mr Watters: I think there is one authority which has been challenged for not having its special parking area properly and legally in place at the moment. Q248 Chairman: And you could point us towards which one? Mr Watters: I think so. Q249 Clive Efford: Just following up on a question we asked last week, when you were suggesting that authorities had incentive schemes, you were not including Westminster in that? Mr King: Westminster, when parking was first decriminalised, did have ticket targets, but that is going back ten years and that was proved. They were given targets and there was an agreement with their contractor. They also at various stages have had incentive schemes, but apparently they do not have them now. Q250 Clive Efford: Mr Watters, you mentioned CCTV enforcement. What kind of parking offences is CCTV used for? Mr Watters: It seems to be actually catching people who are stopping to read a map at the moment which is a little bit unfortunate at times because I think that is a very safe thing to do perhaps, and you are legally allowed to stop to pick up and set down of course if there is no loading restriction. CCTV is quite a worry because the first a driver hears of it is the notice to owner through the letterbox, as was mentioned earlier, so you have no chance to recall the event perhaps as easily as going back to the car and having the ticket on the car. CCTV is a worry because it is very remote. Sometimes there are no signs advising you that you are, if you stop very briefly, at risk and I think it needs to be handled very carefully with the code of practice perhaps in the guidance. Q251 Clive Efford: Handled carefully, but not that there should be no circumstances where CCTV ---- Mr Watters: No, but I think it needs perhaps to be addressed very, very carefully. Q252 Clive Efford: I will start with Mr King, but other people may want to comment on this. Do the current requirements for parking capacity need revising? Mr King: I think there is a problem with capacity when you look longer-term. I think we projected that by 2030, there could be 12 million more cars, nine million needing to park off-street and three million on-street. The planning guidance here, PPG3, actually we believe goes against a coherent parking policy. It indicates that there should be a maximum of one and a half car parking spaces per new dwelling, whereas the reality is that you are going to get one-, two- and three-car families whether there are restrictions or not and it is better to get those vehicles off-street where they are less of a danger in safety terms to pedestrians. Q253 Chairman: Mr King, are you suggesting to this Committee that people should have space for parking three cars at every house? Mr King: I am talking about new developments. Rather than some feint hope ---- Q254 Chairman: Yes, but I just want to be clear. You are saying three cars per house? Mr King: Not every house, but I think the restriction to one and a half spaces is unrealistic and what it leads ---- Q255 Chairman: Would it not be simpler just to have car parks and no houses! Mr King: I think people need somewhere to live! Mr Martlew: They could live in their cars! Q256 Clive Efford: But PPG3 does refer to the relationship with public transport links as well. It is not just as simple as 1.5 ----- Mr King: No, but I think, as someone who uses public transport every day, I use the train every day and my season ticket costs me a lot of money, but I still have a car and I use it for other purposes, so the fact that there is public transport there does not mean that someone should not be allowed to own a car and park it safely. Obviously there are problems with historic housing areas, Victorian terraces, because there is limited capacity and there are problems with that, but the planning system is not helping. Q257 Clive Efford: Does central London need more kerbside spaces? Mr King: It needs more spaces for motorcycles in central London because they cause much less congestion and we are very concerned that if you do not get to central London before about 7.15 in the morning, there are no spaces. There is an anomaly in Westminster. At Waterloo Place next to the Institute of Directors, there is a massive car parking area, empty of cars, yet each morning the motorcycle bays are absolutely full. We have made representations on numerous occasions to open up some of those bays to motorcycles and I am afraid nothing has happened Mr Welsh: We have got a very similar problem with the freight industry. What we have found is that, as new development has taken place, a lot of loading and unloading bays have been with withdrawn which has meant of course that our members have picked up more parking fines as a result of that. I said it earlier, but I will repeat it, and that is that what there needs to be is a review, an ongoing review, of the need for loading and unloading provision so that we can make access as appropriate. Q258 Mr Goodwill: There have been a number of cases around the country where appeals have thrown up the fact that local authorities have been acting illegally. In some cases the whole scheme has been illegal for legal reasons and there is one in my constituency of a case like that, but there are other cases in other places, like Sunderland, where bays are incorrectly marked, lines are incorrect and signs are wrong. How widespread a problem is this and how aware are motorists of the way that they can challenge in this way? Mr Watters: I think there are probably numerous examples where traffic orders do not match the regulations signed on the ground, but it is very hard to tease it out. I think when decriminalised parking was rolled out, the orders were supposed to have been inspected and the signs and markings checked, and I am sure that it takes some astute motorists to go and find these places because no one else is doing this, perhaps the adjudicators are finding some. I am concerned that things do not match and I think the public want to feel that it is completely transparent. I do not think the public should be the ones to find out that things do not match. Q259 Mr Goodwill: Do you feel that in these cases the local authorities have an obligation to issue refunds to people who have been illegally fined in these cases, not just the people who have come forward, but actually to go back to those cases and identify people who have been illegally charged? Mr Watters: To be completely transparent, they should. I think that is why we call for compensation or some sort of costs awarded when the motorist finds that it is wrong. Q260 Mr Goodwill: I just have a question for the freight people and the breweries. There have been one or two cases in the media where Tesco's have been taking over convenience stores and been delivering with very large vehicles. Do you think the breweries and the people who deliver have a part to play in this by having suitable vehicles to deliver into congested areas and is this a problem that is getting worse? Mr Bracey: As far as we are concerned, we do have different types of vehicles, different sizes obviously to try and meet some of these problems, but again when you are trying to deliver three or five tonnes of beer to one pub, you do need basically the 17-tonne dray. Just to touch on appeals, my largest depot that picks up tickets is Tradeteam in Enfield and they pick up over 300 a month. They decided last year to put somebody in full-time, appealing against every ticket. Now, this is not good practice with every single ticket. The interesting fact that comes out of this is that five boroughs in London issue 88 per cent of their tickets, and I could tell you who they are, but you know who they are anyway, and the interesting point is that out of 3,065 PCNs appealed against, 1,039 were upheld which is 37.2 per cent and it saved them over £70,000. I think it is not a good case because we do not want this, but what it highlights is how many bad tickets are really being issued. Chairman: We will come to that. Q261 Mr Martlew: Before I get to the specifics, I am a bit confused by the evidence that we have received. It seems that you all want annual reports, you all want compensation paid, you do not think they pay the people who issue the parking tickets enough, the back-office people are too junior, but how do you expect this to be paid for? Is this to come from putting up the fines or should it come out of council tax? Mr King: No, I think there is enough money in parking to actually come from the fines. If you look at the figures, particularly for city boroughs, they make immense profits out of parking, so ---- Q262 Mr Martlew: That is a general sweeping statement though. Have you got the evidence for that? Mr King: Well, certainly from Westminster, Camden, areas like that. Q263 Mr Martlew: Some of us do live outside of London. Mr King: Yes, and the bigger metropolitan areas, Manchester, Newcastle, whatever. If it is an efficient system, it need not cost a lot of money, so I think it could be done quite easily. Mr Watters: The benefits go wider. There are also safety and traffic reasons for doing this and if parking in towns is more logical and more easy, people will use those towns, so there is an economic case to argue for having rules that are reasonably enforced and that places are welcoming, so it should pay for itself arguably. Mr Welsh: Prior to decriminalisation, we did not have a problem. Industry was able to make deliveries to retail premises ---- Q264 Chairman: Yes, but was that because it was not properly enforced? Mr Welsh: Sorry? Q265 Chairman: Was it because the level of enforcement was not adequate? Mr Welsh: No, I do not think so. Again we have supported the level of enforcement. Where there is clear breach of loading provision or clear breach of the parking rules, then fine, they should be dealt with, but, as I said, it is a complex problem. A lot of loading and unloading bays have been taken out. Q266 Mr Martlew: We are talking about parking charges and parking fines. Do you really think that local authorities should have discretion on this or should there be a standard throughout the country, especially on parking fines? Mr Watters: I think the penalties should be at a reasonably set level, not by the local authority, but by national government probably. We have always taken issue with London having different fees from outside of London in some respects for clamping and towing away in particular, but in terms of how much they charge for the space, that is market forces really, local areas. Q267 Chairman: Are you asking for an independent audit of traffic regulation orders, signs and lines? Mr Watters: I think that is called for. I think there is too much doubt about how many do stack up. Q268 Graham Stringer: Just on that point, why should there be a national standard of fines? Why, if there is a bigger problem in Manchester than Scarborough, should Manchester not say, "We want to fine you ten times as much for breaking the rules"? Why should we have this national standard? Mr Watters: Because the punishment should probably fit the crime and if you overstay at a meter that you have paid a couple of pounds at for a couple of minutes, it would seem disproportionate to charge £100. Q269 Graham Stringer: That is not the question I am asking you. I am asking why the punishment, the fine, should be the same in Scarborough as it is in Manchester so that if you have overstayed by an hour in Scarborough, why should the local authority not say, "We haven't got too bad a problem here in the winter, it is only a £20 fine", and in Manchester where parking in the wrong place could bring the city centre to a halt, you could be fined potentially £300? Mr Watters: I think because some of the local authorities have lost public confidence. There will be a feeling that there was a revenue-collection exercise going on, so if the penalties were set, say, by government, people would feel that it was less of the local authority trying to make a profit. I am not saying they should park illegally, but ---- Q270 Graham Stringer: But why should Birmingham and Manchester not be able to say, "We've got a problem here. We want to put a large disincentive in to breaking the regulations. We are looking after our city centre/town centre"? Why should they not be allowed to have bigger fines? Mr King: I think it depends very much on the actual offence and I think if the offence is parking on a double-yellow line, on a pedestrian crossing or outside a school, causing an obstruction, I think that it is absolutely just to have higher fines and to be set accordingly. Q271 Graham Stringer: And to be set locally? Mr King: Yes, but if the offence is overstaying on a meter by five minutes, then I think that would be very unfair. However good your watch is, and I have an expensive watch, self-winding, but it loses time and every so often I have to look at Big Ben and adjust my watch, so if I overstay by five minutes, I think it would be vastly unfair if I was hit with a £200 fine. Graham Stringer: It would be cheaper to buy a less expensive watch! Q272 Chairman: They do funny things in the RAC! Mr Welsh: From the freight industry point of view, I think the most important thing for us is to have a standardised and consistent approach to the rules right across the country and that is why we are asking for the guidance. I think we accept, as the motoring organisations do, that there should be a variable fine according to the severity of the problem and if we can get that, get a uniform system across the country and, for example, if we had just the standard uniform description or definition of loading and unloading right across the country, that would be a great help because we have not got that at the moment and that is why ---- Q273 Chairman: I am going to stop you there because I want to ask you very briefly, before we finish, what about pavement parking? Mr Watters: It is a very difficult area because it is something that applies in parts and not other parts, so if you park on the pavement in one place, you get a ticket and if you park in another, you do not, and you do not know anything about it often because it is not a signed restriction. Q274 Chairman: So you are saying that the clarification of the signs would deal with that? Is that what you are saying? Mr Watters: Yes. Q275 Chairman: People would then be quite clear where they could and could not park and they would, therefore, be entirely responsible if they ignored that? Mr Watters: Yes, the legislation only applies to London and it does not apply elsewhere. Q276 Chairman: If parking attendants were given more discretion to issue and cancel penalty charge notices, would that be a good idea? Mr King: Yes, I think more flexibility. The kind of place where that could help is where someone buys a ticket from the pay-and-display and you have got a residents' parking zone right next to a pay-and-display, so people have legitimately bought the ticket, but they park in the wrong space because it is not well signed, but they have bought the ticket, so in those cases I think there should be more discretion. Chairman: So clarification, uniformity of approach, clarity of fining with a degree of flexibility for local authorities, special consideration for breweries or, alternatively, encouraging people not to drink beer, and no, it is not an official Labour Party policy! Graham Stringer: Quite the reverse! Q277 Chairman: And, as far as you are concerned, a degree of flexibility in the application of fines? Is that right? Mr Watters: Yes. Chairman: Thank you very much, gentlemen. You have been very informative. Memoranda submitted by the Chief Parking Adjudicator (National) and the Chief Parking Adjudicator for London
Examination of Witnesses
Witnesses: Ms Caroline Sheppard, Chief Parking Adjudicator for England and Wales; and Mr Martin Wood, Chief Parking Adjudicator for London, PATAS, gave evidence. Q278 Chairman: Good afternoon. I am very glad to see you here. May I ask you firstly to identify yourselves? Mr Wood: I am Martin Wood and I am the Chief Parking Adjudicator for London. Ms Sheppard: I am Caroline Sheppard. I am the Chief Parking Adjudicator for the National Parking Adjudication Service. I cover England and Wales, but not London. Q279 Chairman: Did either of you have anything you wanted to say before we started? Mr Wood: I wonder if it might be helpful just to briefly state what the adjudicators' perspective on this is and what the big issues are. Q280 Chairman: Excellent idea. Mr Wood: I think everyone recognises that parking control is an important and valuable function and a very necessary one. Reading yesterday in The Times about the situation in Paris where perhaps things are not enforced as they are here, one can appreciate why it is important that we do have parking controls. I think one has to see this, particularly when one gets to the enforcement stage, as not just about parking, but it is actually about law enforcement and it is about the power of the state to impose a penalty on the citizen and, therefore, it must be done right. Now, there is a debate about the extent to which it is not done right and, from our perspective and our position, we are not in a position to quantify that, but our concern really is about quality. The adjudicators do continue to see some issues that do concern them and I think there are two really key issues that need to be highlighted. The first is that local authorities' enforcement processes need to be legally compliant, they need to be carried out in the way that the law says they should be carried out and there are occasions when that is not the case. Q281 Chairman: Why? Mr Wood: Well, why would be a question you would have to put to the local authorities, but, as an example, we have an instance which has come to our attention recently where a local authority has been issuing what is called the 'charge certificate' and that is a document which says, "You have no further right to contest this penalty which has now gone up by a further 50 per cent", and this local authority has been issuing some of these documents at a time when an appeal has been pending before the adjudicators. Q282 Chairman: Wait a minute, let me get the order right. They get the original charge, they then appeal against it and you are saying that a local authority that you know of is issuing this prohibition, when, at what stage - before the appeal is heard? Mr Wood: Before the appeal has been decided, whereas it should not be issued until the appeal has been decided, so that is an example. The other issue that I think needs to be highlighted is that training has been mentioned and it seems to the adjudicators that that is absolutely central to getting the enforcement process dealt with correctly, and that relates both to parking attendants and, equally importantly, to the in-house staff who deal with the representations that are received. I think those are the key issues from the adjudicators' point of view. Q283 Chairman: That is very helpful. Do you think that the Parking Adjudication Service could be seen, or is seen, as truly independent when it is funded and governed by the same councils whose decisions it is asked to review? Mr Wood: Certainly that is a question that some appellants put to the adjudicators, but, as we always reassure appellants, we are judicial appointments and we are appointed with the consent of the Lord Chancellor. Whether they win or lose their appeal makes absolutely no difference to us and we are entirely impartial and have no stake in the outcome and act quite independently. Q284 Chairman: So it would not be affected by your being funded by some other source? Mr Wood: No, the fact that we are funded effectively by the local authority does not affect our independence at all. Q285 Chairman: Do you think that the fact that the Association of London Government runs the London Parking Adjudication Service is an appropriate level of independence? Mr Wood: Certainly there could well be an argument in terms of the perception of independence for the appeal service to be operated by somebody else, but certainly, as far as the actuality of independence is concerned, people can be assured that we are acting entirely independently. Q286 Chairman: Can I ask you, Ms Sheppard, how do you ensure consistency in the outcome of appeals across the country and over a period of time? Ms Sheppard: I think consistency is regarded as a problem, although I think there are two different views on what consistency actually is. For example, the councils perceive our decisions nationally as being inconsistent and they talk quite a lot about this amongst themselves, but recently, prior to a conference I was having of all our adjudicators, I got our Tribunal Manager to write to all the councils and ask them to produce examples from 2005 of the decisions they regarded as inconsistent, also of a helpful decision that they had lost and a helpful decision that they had won. Only 40 per cent of them availed themselves of the opportunity to actually raise this more specifically with us and of the ones that did come back to us, and a lot of them were very helpful, in at least 60 per cent of the examples that were produced to us as being inconsistent, we did not think they were because it was about the difference of the burden of proof of the evidence. The council had simply seen it, for example, as a ticket not being on display in a car and then, for example, we might have heard oral evidence in one case from the appellant which we accepted, whereas in perhaps another one there was much weaker evidence, or possibly we did not believe the appellant. Therefore, they would have different outcomes, although the councils were producing these examples as ones that they regarded as inconsistent. There is certainly work to be done in trying to explain to the councils how we reach our decisions and that is undoubtedly clear, but I think perhaps the perception of consistency is not as clear as the councils would think. Q287 Mrs Ellman: The Freight Association suggested that over-zealousness was a characteristic in London only. Would you accept that? Ms Sheppard: Well, one of the things I was going to say at the beginning is obviously we have heard talked about good and bad councils and some of the councils outside London are, I think, outstanding in what they are doing and certainly in our annual reports we try to focus on different types of statistics. We look at how many cases they win, what percentage of PCNs issued are appealed, we also look at the percentage they do not contest, and I can say without any hesitation in our recent annual report that is about to be published that Harrogate, Sefton, Herefordshire and Winchester all have outstanding records across the board in that and I think there are a lot of very good councils outside London. Having said that, I think there are also ones where certainly we hear about over-zealousness. I think one of the problems with over-zealousness again is that it is actually misunderstood, if I may say, because I think in many ways the parking attendants are probably just doing as they have been told to do and I feel quite strongly that a lot of this is not necessarily down to the individuals on the street in their uniforms who are walking around, issuing tickets. I think a lot of them are acting on instructions. I think a lot of the problem arises thereafter when people write in and explain what may have happened and I think that one of again the misconceptions about the nature of the scheme is that councils feel that the only question that they have to ask themselves is: was the parking attendant correct to issue the ticket? If the answer to that is yes, then it stands, whereas of course there may well be other explanations. You have heard about loading and unloading already, and quite often there may be no criticism whatsoever to a parking attendant issuing a ticket to a car on a yellow line, but subsequently somebody might write in and say, "I was actually delivering a washing machine to a second-floor flat", which they are entitled to do, that is a lawful activity, it is a legal exemption, and the councils do not necessarily perceive it as such. Q288 Mrs Ellman: Does that mean then that you do not accept the view that over-zealousness applies just to London? Ms Sheppard: I think there are some examples and certainly we hear accusations of it. It is very difficult for us actually to make any true findings about that. Mr Wood: It depends what one means by "over-zealousness". I think one has to distinguish between cases. There is talk of bad tickets. Now, to my mind, a bad ticket would be one which was unlawfully issued. When one talks about over-zealousness I think one may be talking in the context of, "I only over-stayed by three or four minutes. Why did I have to get a ticket for that?" One can take different views about whether it is over-zealous or not to issue a ticket for over-staying for such a short time, but it is not unlawful to issue one in that situation. I think one needs to distinguish between lawfulness and matters of policy and zealousness, which are matters of policy. Q289 Mrs Ellman: There could be two adjoining boroughs, one operating decriminalised parking and one not and that means the appeals process would be different in those two instances. Do you think that presents a problem? Ms Sheppard: I think it is a matter of enormous concern. I think it is totally inappropriate in this country that on one side of the road you are treated as a criminal, you go through the courts and obviously the sanction for not paying is imprisonment, and yet if you do exactly the same thing on the other side of the road it is a civil contravention. I think it is uncomfortable, but it is obviously a pragmatic approach that has been adopted by the Government. I am not sure they could do anything else about it at that stage. Q290 Mrs Ellman: Would you want to see parking matters decriminalised everywhere? Ms Sheppard: Obviously you have been hearing about public information from previous witnesses. If there was a unified scheme now it would make this whole issue of public information much easier because in that way obviously the same process of enforcement would be applied across the country. Mr Wood: A major difference between the two systems is that in the decriminalised system you have a fixed penalty which you do not have in the criminal system, the penalty is in the discretion of the magistrate. Q291 Mrs Ellman: Do you think everything should be decriminalised? Mr Wood: I think it is desirable to have a single scheme across the country. The move is certainly towards decriminalisation. Ms Sheppard: Having said that, the magistrates have a terrific power that the adjudicators do not and that is that they can give an absolute or a conditional discharge. Their system is more responsive to this area of proportionality, which is what I think we have been talking about with over-zealousness. Obviously Mr Wood has clarified it helpfully. For example, if somebody comes to us and says, "I was the only car in the car park. I was parked slightly outside the bay because there was a tree and my dog was in the car and it was a sunny day. There are photographs that show that the car park was virtually empty and yet because it had two wheels over the bay it received a penalty charge," we do not have the power to mitigate the penalty in those circumstances if the council are insisting on pursuing that penalty, but the magistrates do have that power. Q292 Mrs Ellman: Who should be responsible for motorists knowing more clearly the processes that are involved and what their rights of representation are? Should the Adjudication Service be doing more? Mr Wood: The point at which motorists need to know what their rights are is the point at which this whole process starts and that is where they get a penalty charge notice. There are legal requirements for a penalty charge notice to state what the motorist's rights are. They could be stated more fully, particularly in drawing attention to the fact that at the end of the day the motorist will have a right of appeal to an adjudicator and, similarly, to draw attention to the fact that the motorist can make informal representations to the council at an early stage. So certainly the rights need to be stated more clearly. The appropriate place is on the penalty charge notice which is what starts the whole process going. Q293 Mrs Ellman: How should that be achieved, by statutory guidance or some other means? Ms Sheppard: At present the requirement to inform the public is a bit like a board game, ie it is only when you are on the square before that you can see what is on the next square; it is a bit like Alice in Wonderland. The penalty charge notice says that you can write in informing or that you will get a notice but it does not set out the statutory grounds. Nobody has a clue what they may or may not say. At that stage people do write in and say what they want to be considered. People need to have a more general understanding of the scheme. Loads and loads of people do not know that Martin Wood and I exist. They do not know that there are two tribunals that are available if they disagree with things. Q294 Chairman: So we should have a little publicity campaign about you both. Ms Sheppard: Not necessarily. Q295 Chairman: Perhaps some talking heads! Ms Sheppard: It is not well known what the scheme is. Q296 Mrs Ellman: Who is responsible for that? Ms Sheppard: Ultimately the Department for Transport has a role to play in this in terms of public information. Some councils have websites and some do not; some put their policies on the websites and some do not. A copy of the Traffic Regulation Orders in terms of where you can load and unload, for example, is not available in many councils. If you could look on a website and see when you were allowed to load or unload then it would be their responsibility. Q297 Mrs Ellman: Who should be responsible for making sure that is the case? Ms Sheppard: Each council must be responsible for their own council, but there needs to be general advice about the process. The councils need to explain their regulations and their policies and there has to be more general information about the whole citizen's right in terms of the process. Q298 Mrs Ellman: Should a longer time be allowed for rebates on fines so that people can make representations properly? Mr Wood: Are you talking about the 14-day period? Q299 Mrs Ellman: Yes. Mr Wood: There is clearly a case for having an incentive to pay early and have the matter over and done with. One can debate the 14-day period, one could say it could be 21 or 28 days, but at the end of the day it is a little bit of an arbitrary period. One does not want it to be too extended, one wants to get the process moving. I would not have any strong views about the 14-day period. Ms Sheppard: It does cause a lot of problems because in many cases, if people have not found the penalty charge notice on their car, the first time they hear about it is when they get a notice to owner 28 days later or possibly, as in some cases, five months later saying that the penalty charge notice was issued. Regrettably, there are a few councils who take the view that "We stuck it on the car and so it's tough luck". Many councils are more reasonable about that and do say "Well, alright" and re-offer the discount. We have a lot of very disgruntled people because it is not a trivial amount of money. This is thought to be small beer and quick and easy justice, but to a lot of people £30 or £50 is a lot of money and I just do not think we should ignore that. Mr Wood: Indeed £100. Q300 Mr Scott: What steps would you recommend that local authorities take to use more discretion so that it does not perhaps ever reach you? Mr Wood: At the end of the day, of course, the exercise of discretion is a matter of policy for the local authorities. The adjudicator's job is to apply the law. We do certainly encourage local authorities to re-offer the 14-day discount when they receive early representations and if they reject those representations then to re-offer the discount. I think all but two local authorities in London do that. I think the important point is for local authorities to understand that they do have this discretion to waive a penalty, but I am afraid, from what the adjudicators see, it is not always the case that local authorities appreciate that. They confuse discretion with the right to have a penalty cancelled. For example, one sees letters from local authorities that say, "We are satisfied the contravention occurred so we are not going to exercise our discretion." That entirely misunderstands the nature of discretion because the whole point is discretion only arises when you have decided that a contravention occurred and you are then deciding whether you should enforce the penalty or not. Q301 Chairman: Who is responsible for making sure that local authorities know what they are doing, which would be a start, and that the public have some idea what local authorities are doing, which would move us on a bit? Ms Sheppard: I have been involved in this from day one. I think originally this was new stuff for councils. Q302 Chairman: So it is your fault! Ms Sheppard: I think originally they thought it was like the council tax. As you know, there are very few reasons why you can avoid liability for council tax. I think that is very much how they set about it. As Mr Wood was saying earlier on, I think they thought that decriminalisation was delegalisation and they thought that this was an administrative act. So obviously they have had a lot of learning to do along the way. It is their job. Already the issue of training and back-office staff has come into this. I am not convinced that in many councils very high priority is given to the operation of the parking departments. It is not the fault of the staff themselves personally. I simply do not think they get the appropriate training or support that they need. I think in many ways they sort of use the fact that it is a legal process to say, "Oh well, this is out-with the other areas of the council." So you see, for example, letters not being replied to for five months whereas you know that it is a beacon council in every other department and everything is dealt with within ten working days. For some reason or other these departments are left on their own and they are not supported to the extent that would make it into the sort of service that the public is entitled to expect. Mr Wood: I think what is surprising is that there is no requirement for parking attendants to have any training at all as a matter of law and they are carrying out law enforcement and, similarly, the back-office staff. It seems to me that at the end of the day it is for the Department for Transport to introduce some requirement either through the statutory guidance or whatever. Q303 Mr Scott: Would you say that confusion can sometimes be there for members of the public in that when they go 50 yards into another council they have a completely different set of rules for parking in the first place? Would you agree that that causes a fair amount of confusion to the public and that perhaps there should be some uniformity about it? Mr Wood: The basic position is that where you park there should be signs telling you what the restrictions are at that point and provided the signs are clear and adequate you should be able to tell what you can and cannot do. There is a big exception to that, which is the rather archaic controlled parking zone. I do not know if Members are familiar with that. Essentially in a controlled parking zone there is no requirement for there to be signs at the point of parking where you have entered the zone and the entry sign tells you what the parking restrictions are. So you can enter a zone, drive half a mile, decide to park and then you think, "Have I passed a sign? What on earth did it say?" In London you can go across several of these zones and when you decide to park you have not a clue whether you can or cannot park. I think the controlled parking zone in particular does cause a lot of confusion. Q304 Mr Donaldson: Let us move on to the issue of statutory guidance and codes of practice. Which recommendations of the parking adjudicators do you think should be picked up in the statutory guidance and which in the code of practice? Ms Sheppard: I am not sure why we have got two different documents to be honest. I am not at all sure how this has developed, it may be a resource issue. Statutory guidance is very, very valuable partly because it is the next best thing to legislation. If councils fail to comply with it the High Court will take account of it and so will the adjudicators and that is why it is very important that the most important aspects of this scheme are contained in statutory guidance. The guidance that was issued in 1995, which drew on the early experience of London, is a fantastically good document and it has a lot of very practical guidance for councils and indeed if it is in bold it is guidance that they must follow. As I understand it the new guidance that has been prepared has much higher level principles but it will be much harder to pin it down on councils and say that they have failed to comply with paragraph 5(2). We find in towing away cases the guidance that exists now is excellent. For example, the guidance says that if there are four wheels still on the ground when the person returns to his car then the procedure should be stopped and they should be allowed to drive away. If they do not do that we allow the appeal on the grounds that they have failed to comply with the guidance. Unless these things are in the guidance at the end of the day there will be more opportunities to play fast and loose with them. Q305 Mr Donaldson: Would you like to see penalty charge notices go to the driver rather than the vehicle owner? Do you think that would reduce the number of appeals? Mr Wood: The position generally speaking is that it is the owner of the vehicle who is legally liable for the penalty. The penalty charge notice needs to go to that person. Ms Sheppard: Having said that, of course, particularly in these cases where the penalty charge notice was not found the half rate is offered to the driver, but it is not offered to the owner who is the person who is liable to pay. This is a complete conundrum that is in the scheme. A lot of the arguments are when people say, "I have received a notice to owner. I am legally liable by statute for this penalty, but I was not offered the privilege of paying at the reduced rate." Q306 Mr Donaldson: Are you satisfied with the role that adjudicators have had in the design of the statutory guidance? Mr Wood: Both Ms Sheppard and I are members of the working group that is presently working on the statutory guidance, so we are heavily involved in it. Q307 Chairman: I find that a bit worrying in view of what Ms Sheppard has just said. Ms Sheppard: It is early days. Q308 Chairman: Ms Sheppard was making it clear that she was concerned that it would move from being a fairly straightforward and easily understandable document to being something which was on a different level and that was perhaps not as clear. Mr Wood: I share her view that the current guidance is a very useful document and that the new guidance should draw heavily on it. Chairman: Forgive me, Mr Wood, but that rather implies exactly the same thing that Ms Sheppard said because you have not said you were sure it would be the same as the existing document, you said you share her view it should be. The English language is very good in conditional tenses. You have to listen to what it says. Q309 Mr Donaldson: Ms Sheppard, in your annual report you recommended that the Local Government Ombudsman be involved in the drafting of the statutory guidance. Why do you feel this is important, and is it your understanding that this has been implemented? Ms Sheppard: The Local Government Ombudsman produced a very helpful report about the accuracy of forms and the approach to discretion. In terms of how the thing is managed from the back office, it is quite clear that some of the Local Government Ombudsman's recommendations in other departments are not being applied and it is really almost a message to the councils that these procedures are as valuable as any others they do. There is this problem whereby a lot of people's cases fall between two stools in that because they require the exercise of discretion or because their complaint is effectively about how their case has been handled they may not fit within our grounds of appeal and yet for a long time the Local Government Ombudsman said, "Hang on. There is a parking adjudicator. You cannot come to us because you have got your own tribunal." Obviously we have been talking more to the Local Government Ombudsman about trying to clarify that. Nevertheless, the scheme does actually have a big black hole between us and them which is why I think it is important we all speak to each other and try and clarify those issues. Q310 Mr Donaldson: Do you think the guidance should include standards for the use of bailiffs to collect outstanding parking penalties? Do you feel that the public is properly protected from the use of debt recovery agencies by local authorities in this area? If not, what should be done about it? Ms Sheppard: We see these things really after what is called the statutory declaration, which is when the debt has been registered at the county court. If the process has not been properly gone through, they have not received the appropriate notices, then the case can be referred to us. Obviously we do not deal too much from the adjudication end with bailiffs. We do have cases where the bailiffs have been involved. I think it very much depends on the bailiff. It is the county court's role to regulate bailiffs. I am not aware that in this scheme there is any provision legally for councils to use anything other than other debt collection agencies. It is not provided for in the Road Traffic Act. The only provision is debt registration at the county court followed by a warrant issued to bailiffs. Therefore if they are using other debt recovery services presumably their legal departments may have given them advice. I think basically the legal departments need to be much more involved in this process. There is no doubt about it, a lot of the difficulties that councils have got themselves into are because they have not referred things to their lawyers. All the cases where the lawyers have become involved have been incredibly helpful in terms of the parking department realising exactly what their duties are. I certainly would hope that again the guidance will recommend that the legal departments take a much more active and supervisory role over all these activities and debt collecting must be crucial, but it should be appropriately supervised at the right level. Q311 Mr Donaldson: Do you think the adjudicators should have a role and a power to investigate the allegations of bad practice by bailiffs and debt recovery agencies in relation to parking penalties? Ms Sheppard: I do not personally think the adjudicators should do it. I think we agree about this, do we not? Mr Wood: Yes. Ms Sheppard: One of the crucial things about our independence is that we do not have any financial interest in this whatsoever and therefore I do not think we should be involved where they are looking at the collection of penalties. The county court is perfectly able to do that, if they are willing to and that is one of their functions because ultimately the bailiffs are under the supervisory role of the county court judges who look at that and I think that that is a good place for it to be. Q312 Mr Goodwill: Where an appeal is successful for technical reasons, maybe a bay has been incorrectly marked at the side of the road, do you communicate that fact back to the local authority and tell them that they are acting illegally in levelling a fine? Mr Wood: The decision that is made will state the reasons and so they would see those reasons. In appropriate cases as well I will reinforce that by writing a letter to the parking manager. The actual adjudicator's reason will state why the appeal has been allowed. Q313 Mr Goodwill: But the local authority could continue to issue fines on that particular parking bay if it chose so to do. Mr Wood: If the adjudicator has found that the signs are not adequate then that restriction is not enforceable. If the adjudicator has decided that, one would expect the local authority to accept that and put the signs right before continuing enforcement. Ms Sheppard: We had a recent case with a council where 15 different adjudicators had all found the same bay to be inadequately signed and not only did the council just carry on as before, for some extraordinary reason they kept allowing them to come to appeal. In none of the appeal summaries did they say, "By the way, 14 adjudicators have already allowed appeals on this but nevertheless we want to keep going," and ultimately the whole thing was refused. The adjudicator went to the site, all 15 appellants turned up and as they were standing there a car pulled up - the case was all about the pay and display machine in the car park being next to the bay on the street - and out got a motorist who did exactly what the other 15 had done, ie they parked, they went to the machine and all the appellants said, "Stop! You will get a ticket." Even then the council wrote in afterwards and said there had been a stunt, that one of the appellants had organised for one of their friends to come and do that. So it is not always very reliable. Mr Wood: One of our concerns is what mechanisms local authorities have for dealing with feedback from the adjudicators through their decisions and through their reports and through letters and so on. One of our recommendations in our report was that they must have proper feedback mechanisms for identifying these sorts of issues and taking the appropriate actions but, as Ms Sheppard says, it does not always happen. Q314 Chairman: You do not think there was somebody with a particularly dark sense of humour in that council? Ms Sheppard: Possibly. On our recent research a lot of councillors came back and said they found that decision incredibly helpful and they have changed things. We do not want to tar everybody with the same brush. Q315 Mr Goodwill: Presumably those 14 appeals were just the tip of the iceberg. A lot of people would have paid up anyway. Do you think that local authorities have an obligation to issue apologies and refunds to people who have been illegally fined? Ms Sheppard: That is very difficult because each case turns on its own facts. Q316 Chairman: It is an interesting point. Did any adjudicator offer compensation to somebody in that set of circumstances? Ms Sheppard: If they had applied for costs we would have done so, but because they all went in front of different adjudicators nobody picked up that there was a pattern. Certainly by case seven we would have regarded it as wholly unreasonable for them to be contesting the appeal having lost six on the same point, and had that appellant asked for costs, I cannot think of an adjudicator who would have refused it. Q317 Chairman: Since it is not a legal case, would they know that they could ask for costs and compensation? Ms Sheppard: We certainly inform them. Costs are not normally awarded, it is only in very limited circumstances, but when they get their decision from the adjudicator it sets out the provisions about costs, we tell them their rights. Mr Wood: Costs can only be awarded if the adjudicator finds that the council have acted wholly unreasonably, vexaciously or frivolously. Q318 Mr Goodwill: Do you think it would be useful in cases like this if at least the information about how many people have been illegally fined could be in the public domain so that people could think, "Wait a minute, I was fined there three months ago. I must now go to the council for a refund"? Ms Sheppard: This is how we ultimately discovered about this case, it appeared in the press and that is how we realised we had had 15 cases. They have very good computer systems. Parking industries supply them with excellent systems. They can easily draw off a report saying how many tickets they have issued road by road and contravention by contravention. Q319 Chairman: What about the idea of a parking regulator overseeing local authority parking policy, is it a good idea or a bad idea? Mr Wood: I think one would have to ask exactly what the regulator's role would be within all of this. I am not necessarily convinced that another body would be helpful. Q320 Clive Efford: Do you have a view on incentive schemes for parking enforcement officers, and do you have any evidence of any link between incentive schemes and the issuing of inappropriate penalty charge notices? Mr Wood: I have very strong views about incentive schemes and that is that there should not be any. Anything that encourages people to issue tickets other than on their absolute merits is to be deprecated and potentially is very dangerous. I have no specific evidence of any links between any such schemes and --- Q321 Clive Efford: Then why would you oppose them? Mr Wood: I would oppose them because of the potential. The fact that as a member of the public you are aware that there are these incentive schemes is certainly not going to improve confidence in the impartiality of the enforcement process. Ms Sheppard: Obviously compliance plays a big part in this. Inevitably if an area has not been enforced and it is enforced quite vigorously then people do comply. A lot of people, having got their ticket, are warned off and that is how it goes. In some areas obviously the ability to issue the same number of tickets actually diminishes, particularly in smaller areas outside London. We have got plenty of evidence of councils issuing less tickets year by year. Obviously the incentives play a problem against compliance. We have seen a case where tickets have been issued at three in the morning out of the blue, although a parking contravention probably occurred, but it is back to proportionality again and obviously it does have an effect on that. Q322 Clive Efford: Is there any evidence that local authorities at times do not apply enough discretion when dealing with businesses that need to park where there are parking restrictions in order to carry out their daily business? Mr Wood: Adjudicators deal with each individual case on its particular facts. If there is a case where the adjudicators consider there are compelling mitigating circumstances which they consider warrants the cancellation of the ticket then they will refer it back to the council. I am not aware that adjudicators would be referring back cases where there was effectively a clear breach of the regulations and there was no particular justification. Merely carrying out unloading for business purposes would be regarded by many adjudicators as compelling mitigation for effectively breaching the parking regulations. That is a matter of council policy. Ms Sheppard: There are streets in Manchester and there is one in the City of London where, for example, there is no loading at any time and therefore I do not know how you get goods and service supplies in and out. The other down side of that is that the blue badge holders are not allowed to park where there is a loading ban and so if they need to go into premises in a street where there is no loading at any time it means that you cannot get your disabled driver to avail themselves. Councils must decide where to apply their own regulations, but they really should be reviewing all of this when they take on decriminalisation and ensuring that the regulations are fit for purpose. Q323 Clive Efford: We just heard from Mr Bracey of the Brewery Logistics Group that one company that set about challenging every single penalty charge notice had 37 per cent of them overturned and yet Mr Wood has just said he takes a blanket approach in that if there is a breach of the parking regulations, the fact that they are conducting their business is not a mitigating circumstance. The two do not seem to sit together in my view. Mr Wood: I do not know what he meant by that. It may be that the council decided to allow them on representation. The adjudicator's role and only power is to apply the law. If there has been a breach of the parking regulations we have no power to allow it because of mitigating circumstances. Ms Sheppard: I would like to clarify that point because I am sure what happened in the case that was described to you is that they were lawfully engaged in loading and unloading. With many of the tickets they may have been loading where there is a loading ban and those would not have been overturned because that is a breach of the regulations. If they were on a part where there is not a loading ban and they subsequently proved that they were loading and unloading then that would not have been a parking contravention and the case would have been upheld, and I am sure that is probably the case. Q324 Clive Efford: That is a very high proportion of penalty charge notices issued in error, is it not? Mr Wood: Not necessarily in error because the parking attendant may not have the information to show that loading and unloading was going on. Q325 Clive Efford: How is the person driving the vehicle meant to know? If the parking enforcement officer does not know the regulations then who does? Mr Wood: I am not saying he does not know the regulations. He may not have known as a matter of fact that loading and unloading was going on. The driver may have been out of sight. It may only emerge at the representation stage that the brewery is able to satisfy the local authorities that loading and unloading was going on. It should not be assumed that every time a parking ticket is overturned at the representation stage it was wrongly issued. Ms Sheppard: Certainly not, no. Chairman: You have been very helpful. You have conjured up the most fascinating world. We shall consider your evidence very carefully. Thank you very much for coming. Memorandum submitted by Department for Transport Examination of Witnesses
Witnesses: Ms Karen Buck, a Member of the House, Parliamentary Under Secretary of State, and Mr Mike Talbot, Head of Traffic Management Division, Department for Transport, gave evidence. Q326 Chairman: Good afternoon, Minister. You are most warmly welcome. Would you be kind enough to identify yourself for the record? Ms Buck: My name is Karen Buck. I am the Parliamentary Under Secretary with responsibility for this area of transport policy. I am joined by Mike Talbot who is a senior manager in the Department with responsibility for parking. Q327 Chairman: Did you have something you wanted to say first? Ms Buck: Only very briefly, Chairman, which is just to emphasise the point that I think the debate has moved on a long way in terms of parking policy over recent years from whether there should be any form of parking control to how the enforcement is carried out. The research carried out by Which? magazine confirmed that nine out of ten people now support the idea of parking restrictions, but the concerns really are about how the rules are implemented, the fairness of penalty charges, et cetera. The very large volume of correspondence that we get in the Department on this issue is not around the principle but the enforcement, the lack of parking space, about signage and about the uses to which the parking surpluses are put. To a very large extent these issues are a matter of local concern and accountability, but the Department has to ensure the right regulatory framework and guidance, particularly in recognition of the fact that especially in areas of high demand parking has a role to play in broader transport policy. As I am sure you will know, we are expecting to publish new guidance and regulations in the early part of next year implementing the provisions of the Traffic Management Act. Obviously we will be answering questions and I hope you will forgive me if I turn occasionally to Mr Talbot on matters of detail. Q328 Chairman: Is decriminalised parking enforcement meeting the objectives set out at the time the legislation was written? Ms Buck: I think in many ways it is. I think for the most part the parking provision is working well in most parts of the country. One of the objectives of decriminalised parking was to take the burden off the police and it not being a core police function to police parking. Q329 Chairman: Is it going fast enough in relation to all local authorities? Ms Buck: We have never set out an objective for all authorities having decriminalised parking enforcement, although it makes sense for more to do so. We are encouraged by the take-up of that. Q330 Chairman: Do you want decriminalised enforcement in all local authority areas? Ms Buck: I do not think the objective is to say yes by a particular deadline and that all should be. Q331 Chairman: As a principle, are you anxious to have decriminalised enforcement across all local authorities? Ms Buck: I would not use the word anxious. Q332 Chairman: Let us not start banding words about. We are not dealing with the Deputy Prime Minister. Could we sort out what it is we are talking about? Does the Government accept that all local authorities will have decriminalised regimes at some point in the future? Ms Buck: Broadly speaking, yes. Mr Talbot: I think the answer is that you would expect certainly all urban areas to have decriminalised parking. There may be some smaller authorities in rural areas where it may not necessarily be the right thing for them and it is for them to choose to do it. Q333 Chairman: But you have not got a timetable, have you? Mr Talbot: No. Q334 Graham Stringer: In the evidence from previous witnesses it said they were very concerned about having two completely different penalty regimes in essence, where you could be sent to prison for not paying a fine in an area where public parking had not been decriminalised but not in an area where it had. Are you content in one country that the penalty should be so different, Minister? Ms Buck: In a sense it is the same answer as the one I have just given. There are 170 authorities now that have decriminalised parking enforcement and that is moving forward. Q335 Chairman: Out of 500? Mr Talbot: Yes, but with a very clear emphasis on the major urban authorities and those with the highest demand, and we expect that to continue. It is not a Government objective to say that there is a definite rollout to ensure that all authorities, including those with very low pressures on their parking, should necessarily go down that road. Q336 Graham Stringer: Can you define a bit more clearly for me what you meant when you said that parking is a matter of local concern and accountability? Ms Buck: What we want to see is that parking policy forms part of a broader transport strategy and that there will be different priorities for the ways in which local authorities implement their policy and different measures in different areas, which could include parking, for example, in the context of demand management. Clearly the kind of pressures that inner-London authorities and other inner-urban authorities are under and the way in which they manage their policy will be different to that of a rural community or somewhere with less demand. So in that sense it is right that the implementation of those policies should be a matter for local people to relate to their local authority. Q337 Graham Stringer: I agree with that. I just wonder what you mean in your evidence when you say that there is considerable variation in how effectively the local authorities carry out parking activities. That is bound to be self-evidently true. As some local authorities are less effective, do you think it is your role to involve yourself in their parking policies? Ms Buck: What we are aiming to do - and we will be introducing the statutory guidance and regulations implementing the supervisions of the Traffic Management Act shortly - is to try and ensure that some of the problems have been identified. We freely admit there are areas of delivering a policy that are patchy across the country and they are tackling some of those problems. Although there will not be a standardised policy, we want to make sure there is good practice everywhere and that some of the problems which occur are tackled, for example some authorities not responding to representations within a reasonable timescale. Q338 Graham Stringer: How will you tackle them? I am trying to get at just what is going to be left to local areas and how the Department for Transport will say to an authority, "You're not responding quickly enough, you are too zealous," or whatever it is. How will you deal with that? Ms Buck: In very high demand urban areas local authorities will take their own decisions on the number of residents' parking places that they allocate and they will have certain hours of residents' parking and bays can be used in other hours for other purposes. Those policy issues are for local authorities. Some of the issues that have been identified, for example in the Ombudsman's report, over a lack of consistency in dealing with representations and the time in which representations are heard are reasonable, they are very much the kind of issues that we get a lot of representations about and we would like to see better practice across the board. I do not know whether Mr Talbot would like to add anything. Mr Talbot: I would like to expand upon the mechanism. In the Traffic Management Act we provide for statutory guidance to accompany the regulations under the Act and through that the kind of messages that the Minister is referring to in terms of good practice and raising performance more generally can be emphasised to authorities, and in parallel we have a number of things that we are working on with people within the industry to raise standards more generally through the good practice advice with the Institution of Highways and Transportation and the British Parking Association, where we have been doing things to help improve across the industry the quality and the performance of all those involved. Q339 Graham Stringer: Do you believe that local authorities outside London should be given the power to set their own penalties? There is a nationally determined penalty at the moment outside of London. In terms of catering for the particular problems in Birmingham or Newcastle which will be different from Scarborough, do you think they should be able to determine a higher or a lower level of penalty? Mr Talbot: At the moment authorities can choose outside London one of three penalty levels, the maximum of which is £60 and those are set in guidance by the Secretary of State. It is up to the authority to choose what is appropriate for them. Q340 Graham Stringer: I am sorry if I was not clear enough. I am asking beyond that. I am asking whether there should be more or less total discretion for local authorities to choose the fine they set. Mr Talbot: To date certainly we have tried to maintain a consistency across the country in terms of the levels but still providing a degree of choice and that seems to have worked reasonably effectively. Q341 Graham Stringer: So if Birmingham came along and said, "We've got a big problem with people parking illegally and the fines do not seem to be deterring it, we want to up it to £250," you would consider that, would you? Ms Buck: I certainly do not think it is anything that is under consideration at the moment. Q342 Graham Stringer: There is a different policy in London compared to the rest of the country on parking on the pavements. Do you think it is satisfactory that there is a different policy between London and the rest of the country? Ms Buck: There are very clear differences between inner-London in particular and most other parts of the country in terms of the demand. Mr Talbot: The schemes in London which prevent any parking on the pavement unless otherwise signed are certainly different from most parts of the country, although there are one or two local Acts which have the same effect in one or two areas. We have looked at this from time to time and the problem has always been that if you define no parking on the footway or the verge in all other circumstances except where signed it would not be enforced. The problem that we always ran into when it was considered before and it still remains is that it is really not something that is effectively enforceable across the whole country as there is a diverse range of circumstances. What local authorities that have parking enforcement powers themselves can do is to define for themselves areas where parking on the pavement is not appropriate, so they can deal with it in a local sense and that is what we have encouraged authorities to do. Q343 Clive Efford: Are you satisfied with the extent of external scrutiny of local authority parking departments? Ms Buck: The scrutiny comes from a number of different sources and the Ombudsman is clearly one. In terms of the financial scrutiny of local authorities and the extent to which the revenue is spent on the purposes that are defined, that is open to financial scrutiny. I think there are a range of powers that are available to ensure that those policies and practices are right. There are a number of areas of policy in which this is, rightly, something for which local authorities are accountable to their own electorates. Q344 Clive Efford: Do you think they are adequate? Are you concerned that some parking enforcement officers have pressures put on them to raise revenues and, if so, what sort of measures do you think you could put in place to prevent that happening? Ms Buck: We have made it very clear that parking enforcement and penalty charge notices should not be a source of raising revenue. We are very clear that this should be - and this will be reinforced again in the guidance - about using parking controls as a means of keeping traffic moving as part of an overall traffic management policy. Certainly that would be the case and that is something that is very clearly reinforced in the guidance that we provide. Q345 Clive Efford: Does the Department have a view on setting figures in budget forecasts and that if you put a figure in your budget at the beginning of the year you are in effect setting a target for the next financial year to raise revenues? Ms Buck: Clearly what local authorities will do is anticipate the kind of income that is likely to flow from both their parking charges and PCNs on the basis of past performance. Given that there are some, although not that many, authorities that have historically made reasonably large surpluses and are allowed to spend those surpluses in particularly specified circumstances, they will have to account for them and that will have to appear in the accounts. I suppose the alternative would be that they do not make any projection whatsoever. I am not sure I would worry about the fact that the figures appear in accounts. I think that is different to saying is their parking in some way target driven. Q346 Clive Efford: Do you think there should be any incentive for local authorities to publish how they use that income and figures about penalty charge notices and how much they get from parking revenue? Ms Buck: I think that is absolutely right. One of the themes that regularly comes through in terms of people's concerns about parking issues is a sense of not being clear what income is raised and under what circumstances it is raised because I think people need to be very clear (and they are not) that a lot of the money that is made from parking is made simply from parking charges and not from PCNs. The clarity and transparency of information is absolutely critical, it is something that we are very clear about and we are going to consult on ways in which we can encourage local authorities to perform better in that respect. Q347 Clive Efford: Is that with a view to placing a statutory responsibility on local authorities to publish that information or is that still open for discussion? Mr Talbot: Certainly it is something which we can include in the statutory guidance, which may not go quite as far as being in the regulations and therefore it is not statutory in that way. Since the guidance itself is statutory and local authorities should take account of it, it is a fairly strong encouragement on authorities to fulfil that requirement. Q348 Clive Efford: Why is information about the revenue from different parking activities not held centrally and collected centrally? Does the Department have a proper oversight of local authority parking enforcement? Mr Talbot: The information is provided to different parts of Government. Information is provided to the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister in terms of more general parking revenues and those are the figures which are most commonly quoted, which actually include all the revenues and not just that related to enforcement. One thing which we would like to do with the new guidance is to get that broken down so that there is more transparency and more clarity about the different elements of parking and therefore it is clearer to see where the income and the expenditure is going. The most recent ODPM figures have begun to separate out the on-street and the off-street which is a starter down that particular process. It is certainly something where we would want to encourage more clarity. Q349 Clive Efford: Has the Department any concerns about some local authorities having had incentive schemes for their enforcement officers in order to maximise the number of penalty charge notices that are issued? Mr Talbot: As the Minister said, we are very much of the mind that parking enforcement is a transport related and focussed activity and should be orientated to transport objectives. The fact that it generates revenue in some circumstances is an accidental by-product, although obviously it is quite substantial in some instances. We did fund the British Parking Association to produce a model contract which is designed for local authorities to use where the emphasis moves away from the financial and the ticket numbers objectives to a much broader basket of objectives which relate to the performance of the network, eg is the traffic kept moving or what is the quality of the service offered by the parking attendants. We are moving in that direction and we want to support the moves in that direction. Q350 Clive Efford: Would the Department express any concern to a local authority if it was seen to be over-reliant on income from parking enforcement - a couple of London boroughs spring to mind, one of which the Minister would know very well - and becoming a parking enforcement junky in order to keep their council tax down? Mr Talbot: An oversight of local government is principally an ODPM --- Q351 Chairman: Mr Talbot, you are not getting away with that one. If you are making it clear that this is something that needs to be transparent you need to know whether they are fulfilling their duties under the Transport Act. You are being asked what you would do to make sure that is the case. I think it is really a question for you, Minister, not for Mr Talbot. Ms Buck: It genuinely is part of the ODPM's scrutiny of local authorities. Q352 Chairman: We understand who scrutinises local government finances overall, but you cannot have it both ways. If you need transparency, if this money is being raised, what are you doing to ensure that it is clear to the public how it is being spent? Ms Buck: I think that is the critical thing. The critical thing is that it needs to be absolutely transparent and we accept that it is not entirely transparent. Q353 Chairman: What is your Department actually doing about that? Ms Buck: We will be consulting on measures in the statutory guidance in the new year to improve the clarity and transparency of that information so that the electors of the local authorities in question, among others, are clearer about what the income is, what streams the income is flowing into the local authority from and that they will need to be held to account. It is clearly true that there are some outlying local authorities in terms of the income. It is also true that those local authorities tend to be in the areas of the greatest scarcity of parking places. Q354 Chairman: If you are not making a profit, Minister, I think we can assume that you are not going to be able to spend it. Ms Buck: If parking is part of a broader transport strategy then it is perfectly possible that in a sense you will make a surplus from your parking income for entirely legitimate purposes. Q355 Chairman: Perhaps it would be better if the revenues from the parking notices were paid to the Treasury. Ms Buck: There are pros and cons to doing that. It would be a very bureaucratic process. Q356 Chairman: Local authorities manage to claim back money from central funding to support other aspects of local government administration. Why should it be any more difficult in relation to the normal formula grant? Ms Buck: You have been talking about a very small number of authorities. I think it is a bit like using a hammer to crack a nut. It is quite important to retain an incentive for local authorities - and we do this in other respects as well - to ensure that parking is properly used as a tool within a transport strategy. What we need to do and want to do through greater transparency and clarity of information is ensure that it is not used as a tax raising tool to cross-subsidise the council tax, for example. If a local authority makes a surplus as part of a good transport strategy that is fine. Brighton and Hove are a very good example of that. They went into a significant surplus on their parking account partly as a result of doing some quite intelligent and imaginative policies on making their parking work better as a demand management tool within their transport strategy and I do not have a problem with that, and I think if you took that incentive away from them that would not necessarily be helpful. Q357 Chairman: Presumably they did not have a problem with telling people what they had done with the money. Ms Buck: I sincerely hope not and I think that is very important. Q358 Chairman: You would encourage them to do that and you are thinking of a scheme whereby you may be able to encourage - if no stronger word is needed - local authorities to follow a transparent and a sufficiently guided policy so that people can see they are following the objectives in the Traffic Act. Ms Buck: I think that is absolutely right. Q359 Chairman: When can we expect this to be made clear? Ms Buck: In the early part of next year. Q360 Mrs Ellman: We have had a lot of evidence that there is inadequate information given to motorists about how they could make representations about fines. Who should be putting that right? Is that something the Department should be doing? Ms Buck: The issue of representations we understand is one of the clusters of areas around parking enforcement where I think there is a recognition that there is something of a problem. Within the statutory guidance we will consult on some measures. Some local authorities think they only have a duty to consider representations on statutory grounds whereas we think that all representations have to be considered on their own merits. There is also a case for saying that the adjudicator can refer back to local authorities where there are exceptional circumstances to ask for those to be reconsidered. So those are measures that we will be consulting on. Q361 Mrs Ellman: What about the provision for a 50 per cent discount for payment within 14 days, should that be changed on a national basis so that people are not deterred from making representations? Ms Buck: I do not think so. I think there is an argument that whatever time you set there will always be a pressure immediately under that time. I do not think 14 days is an unreasonable time for people to make their representations. Q362 Mrs Ellman: Do you not think that that is going to deter people from making representations when the time span for those being considered is considerably more than 14 days? Ms Buck: I am not convinced that there is a strong case for changing the 14 days. Q363 Mrs Ellman: Our attention has also been drawn to the confusion between "public" holiday and "bank" holiday resulting in fines on New Year's Day as a result of people not getting proper information as to when fines are levied. Ms Buck: Would you mind if I turned to Mr Talbot on that particular issue? Mr Talbot: It is something that has come up and we have had some correspondence about it from people who have been ticketed on days when they had not expected it. I think there is the general question about information provided to motorists on the streets, about being able to understand that, and it is quite difficult to be entirely prescriptive about it because in some circumstances you may want to have controls on public holidays and bank holidays and you might even want to distinguish between the two because of the particular local circumstances, and so it is trying to promote good practice by the local authorities and encourage them to be explicit about what the regulations are in any particular circumstance. We are certainly keen to see good‑quality and clear information being provided to motorists. It is an issue that has got more complicated as the signage and the regulations have got more complicated simply because of the pressure of competition for kerb space. Q364 Mrs Ellman: Do you take the National Ombudsman's recommendations seriously? Ms Buck: Very much so. I think that some of those issues, which very much reflect some of the pressure of correspondence and concern in recent years, are very much informing some of the work that is coming out and will be consulted on in the new year. Q365 Mrs Ellman: What kinds of discussions have you had about the 2003 recommendations? Mr Talbot: Can I say that in developing the Traffic Management Act regulations and guidance we have had a working group which has drawn together the various stakeholders in the industry, including many of the people who have appeared in front of this Committee, representing both the road users and the local authorities and adjudicators, so across the spectrum of those involved, and we have fed into that process quite a range of documents and reports that have come out over recent years from the Ombudsman, from the British Parking Association, from others who have produced reports in this area. We have been endeavouring to pick up on the various things that have come out of those reports in our deliberations on how to take forward the guidance. Q366 Mrs Ellman: There is one recommendation for an Inspectorate of Civil Traffic Enforcement within local authorities. Have you had any discussions on that? Ms Buck: We are not convinced that there is a need for an additional regulatory body. We are satisfied with some of the enforcement provisions in the field that I have already outlined and we think that that should be adequate without setting up an additional bureaucracy. Q367 Mrs Ellman: When you publish the statutory guidance and code of practice will you be looking at issues to do with loading? Ms Buck: We are very conscious of the issue of freight. Of course, local parking authorities do have to balance the legitimate concerns of businesses in terms of loading against all of the competing pressures on parking, but in terms of the guidance, Mr Talbot, is there anything additional? Mr Talbot: It will not go into great detail because the guidance itself is more of a strategic document. Q368 Chairman: I am sorry, Mr Talbot, I lost the last word. Ms Buck: More of a strategic document. Q369 Chairman: More strategic than that which you have had before? Mr Talbot: Yes. Ms Buck: More strategic than necessarily going into prescriptive detail about, say, loading and unloading versus other --- Q370 Chairman: --- So you are going to address it but you are not going to actually do it in detail? Mr Talbot: Yes, it will not cover it in detail. Q371 Mrs Ellman: Have you identified delivering and loading as a problem for certain users? Mr Talbot: We know that it is a problem in certain areas and that certain types of businesses have particular problems. That is certainly the case. Q372 Mrs Ellman: Which businesses have the most problems on this? Ms Buck: To take an example, if you look at the areas where there is exceptionally high pressure for kerb space and parking space, such as London, this is very much a recognised problem. Transport for London in that sense are looking at a piece of work to develop an action plan on how they deal with freight. I think that is appropriate and in London there is a case for looking at that strategically across the board, but really there is a very strong argument that says that local authorities do need to make some of these decisions in local circumstances because the variation is so huge. Q373 Mrs Ellman: What about bullion deliveries? Is there not a safety aspect there that is of national importance? Has that ever been raised with you? Mr Talbot: I do not remember it being raised although with any parking restrictions and loading restrictions there are usually provisions within the related traffic order where somebody would be allowed to go there and not be penalised for it if appropriate discussions had taken place beforehand. Under the decriminalised parking enforcement regime you could go to the local police station and say, "I have got this problem," and they would work it through, and there should be no reason in principle why not. Q374 Mrs Ellman: Is that something that you think local authorities should deal with or something that the Department should? I have mentioned bullion and there are also beer deliveries. Ms Buck: I am quite happy to take that away and reflect on it because that is new to me. I am slight chary about saying there should be some national policy on particular sectors. The trouble is there is so much competing pressure in some areas and other areas where there simply is not and therefore there is not the need for it. Q375 Chairman: I am sorry, I am not clear what is the point of strategic advice that does not address particular areas, or is it a general broad brush approach "we would like you to control your parking policies"? It could be quite brief. Ms Buck: I think it would be fair to say that there are some areas in which we are being specific, around the area of representations for example, and some areas where it is more about good practice. Q376 Chairman: I do not want to go back over all that; I just want a few simple answers really. Are you aware that parking, loading and unloading is a difficulty in urban areas, and is it your intention to either improve or clarify the existing rules in relation to parking? Ms Buck: I do not believe - and I could be corrected on this by Mr Talbot - that we will be consulting on the guidance on specific proposals around loading and unloading. Q377 Chairman: So it is not your intention to strengthen the existing procedure? Mr Talbot: In addition to the statutory guidance there are various codes of practice being produced, not necessarily by the Department but by others, for example. Q378 Chairman: Whom for example? Mr Talbot: The Association of London Government, for example. Chairman: Yes, but that relates to London. I think Mr Martlew has a point on this. Q379 Mr Martlew: Are you producing statutory guidance and statutory regulations and are they going to be separate or are we going to have a third set, by the sound of it? Ms Buck: There will be both. Mr Talbot: There will regulations and there will be statutory guidance. Q380 Mr Martlew: They will be separate? Mr Talbot: Yes the regulations are separate. Mr Martlew: The regulations and guidance will be different? The adjudicators were querying this when we had them as witnesses before us as to why do we need the two. Chairman: The regulations are the legal things that authorities must do. The statutory guidance is about giving authorities a steer on how to go about it. Q381 Mr Martlew: Why have you put the word "statutory" in front? Ms Buck: They must take account of the proposals. Q382 Mr Martlew: The argument was that really you only needed the one set and it should be the regulations. Can we come on to the adjudicators; a large proportion of the appeals are not contested by the local authorities. Do you believe that compensation should be then given to the people who have appealed? Ms Buck: Pardon? Q383 Mr Martlew: People have been through the system with the local authority and they have turned down their appeal; it has gone to the adjudicator; then the council do not contest that appeal. Do you think that those people who have been through that system should be compensated? Ms Buck: Mr Talbot, can you help me on this one? Mr Talbot: Yes I can. There are different reasons why the authority may not contest the appeal and some of those may be because new information has been provided perhaps in the interim. The adjudicators do have some power to award costs but it is costs rather than compensation, and that is the current position that we have taken. Q384 Mr Martlew: So you are saying costs are fine but you do not believe that compensation should be given; is that the answer? Mr Talbot: That is our current position. Chairman: So we are customer-friendly but not to people who do not pay their fines. Q385 Mr Martlew: We have also heard of one particular instance today where a particular local authority had 16 cases found against it for one particular breach of the regulation in one area. What do you do when you have a situation where the local authorities are not taking note of what the adjudicators are saying? Are you going to force them to do that? Ms Buck: We will certainly be strengthening the powers of the adjudicator to refer back to local authorities in some instances to require them to take account of exceptional circumstances. That is something that will be consulted on in the new year. Obviously again the issue of good practice comes into this very strongly, but I am not sure there is a case that because there are some examples of bad practice there should be a fundamental change in the structure that affects all authorities. I am not sure about that individual case and I will be interested to follow it up in more detail. Q386 Mr Martlew: Finally on a different tack, there is the issue of correct signing. We have heard a lot of complaints about incorrect signing. How do you marry that up in a city like Durham or Carlisle or in an area like Westminster with the need to preserve the cityscape itself? Ms Buck: This is a classic tension between two very reasonable, competing objectives. We do want to reduce street clutter; we do want to maintain the quality of the environment. At the same time it is absolutely clear that the perception of information not being clear to motorists is a major cause of concern. Really the key to this is requiring a regular review and we are insisting certainly where new authorities will be coming into the decriminalised parking enforcement scheme that they should conduct a review of their signage and agree that before they will be given the decriminalised parking enforcement scheme. Q387 Chairman: It does not deal with existing systems, does it? How are you going to deal with the existing systems? Ms Buck: Those authorities that have currently decriminalised parking enforcement are also being asked to carry out periodic reviews of their signage. Clearly in some ways there will be a fundamental contradiction in this and there are not going to be easy answers to it. Q388 Mr Scott: Minister, we have heard from yourself and from others today that in some areas it is a criminal offence, in others it is not a criminal offence; in some areas the signage is appropriate, in other areas it is not appropriate; in some areas unloading is fine and permitted, in other areas it is not. You said just now that you are suggesting there will be a review; you are asking there will be a review. As the Minister will you order that there is going to be a review? Ms Buck: We are saying that when new authorities - and there are a substantial number of those who are likely to come at some stage into decriminalised parking enforcement - we will require them to conduct a review. I believe that the requirement for authorities that have currently decriminalised parking enforcement to carry out a review is something that we will be requiring. Mr Talbot: Certainly each of them when they came into the decriminalised parking enforcement regime would have carried out a review of their signage to make sure that it was up to scratch. That is one of the 20 things that we have on our check-list when they apply for the powers. Clearly it is a matter that over a period of time needs to be kept under review, not least because there is an incrementalism about parking and traffic regulation, that things tend to get put one on top of another and what it needs is every now and again to take a further look --- Q389 Chairman: Mr Talbot, is that not why the Department is there, to deal with the problem of "incrementalism", which is a lovely word? Are you not there to actually give some fairly straightforward instructions to clarify, to say, "This is really what you ought to do now", not over a period of the next 30 or 40 years? Ms Buck: To be fair, Chairman, it is not a question of the next 30 or 40 years, but what we do not want to do is to be constantly requiring those authorities that have only just reviewed or only very recently --- Q390 Chairman: No, but where there is clear evidence that the signage of many local authorities is contributing to confusion, surely - and the adjudicators think this - the Department has an overall role have to tell people clearly what the law is, clearly what their responsibilities are, to make sure that local authorities apply the law fairly and clearly? Do you not accept that? Ms Buck: Totally, totally. I accept completely that that is a requirement on local authorities. I would also say that there is an element of subjectivity in all of this that clearly --- Q391 Chairman: I do not think there is a lot of subjectivity in a sign that cannot be read clearly. Either one can read a sign or one has difficulty. Ms Buck: Only to a certain extent because there is also the problem in some areas where there are so many competing pressures there will be different regulations applying at different times. Chairman: That is precisely the point. I am sorry, I am going to come back to Mr Scott because it is his question. Mr Scott: Thank you, Chairman. Yes, I am a little bit confused --- Chairman: Well done, if you are only a little bit confused! Q392 Mr Scott: I am a little bit confused but I feel sorry for the motorist who I think is going to be very confused. 330 authorities, based on what you said earlier, are not at this moment being asked to review their signage because they are not coming into the decriminalisation section. What period of time do you believe it will be before they are all in this, all doing a review, and we have some form of comprehensive review of the signage so that perhaps the motorists begin to understand? Ms Buck: There is an expectation, well, there is a requirement that signage complies with the requirements of the Department. I think part of the problem, particularly in areas where there is a very high pressure on services, is there are a number of competing requirements, not just in parking but elsewhere in the street furniture, and where for example in my own authority you will have residents' parking and the residents' parking will come off at a certain time, there might be dual use in some areas, that there is going to be a complexity in that signage and the signage is frequently difficult for motorists to follow, precisely because there are so many competing expectations on that. What we are asking is those authorities that currently are in decriminalised parking enforcement areas, and they tend to be those in the most pressurised areas, that those authorities should review their signage to ensure that they are using current best practice, that they are minimising any unnecessary information, and providing the clearest possible information to the motorist. The areas that are not in decriminalised parking enforcement still have to meet base standards. They tend not to be the authorities with the highest level of pressure and the highest level of complexity. When they come into decriminalised parking enforcement which they are steadily so doing (but we do not have, as I said, a target to do so) then they will be required to carry out a full review. Q393 Mr Scott: Does your Department monitor it? Ms Buck: Monitor what, sorry? Q394 Mr Scott: The reviews that take place? Ms Buck: Yes. Mr Talbot: When they apply they have to state that they have carried out a review or that by the time they take on the powers they will have carried out a review and everything will be up to scratch by the time they take on the powers. We do not have the resources to go and check every sign in every authority clearly. We have to take that --- Q395 Mr Scott: So it is not monitored? Mr Talbot: As part of our process when we look at the applications, we check with the police and we check with our colleagues in the Government Office, and if there were questions raised then we would probably go back to the authority and say, "Is this all settled yet?", but we obviously are not in a position to go and do that ourselves. Q396 Mr Scott: Resources are not used by your Department --- Ms Buck: There is a statutory requirement for traffic authorities to place traffic signs which implement their traffic orders. That is a statute. Clearly, as with every other form of enforcement, there is a limit to the resources that you want to spend going round again and again ensuring that is the case. When there are changes or when new authorities come in to the decriminalised parking enforcement scheme they are required to review. Existing authorities are also required to review. Q397 Chairman: So you are writing the statutory guidance and recommendations that local authorities audit and review their traffic regulation orders and signs? Ms Buck: Yes. Mr Talbot: Yes. Q398 Chairman: And that will be quite clear. How regularly? Mr Talbot: I do not think we would necessarily put a specific time on it. You would expect most authorities to be looking at their signs every five years. Q399 Chairman: So you would expect them to consider them strategically? Mr Talbot: I think you would expect the authorities as a matter of general maintenance programmes and within that kind of context to be looking at their signs every five years anyway. They might need to review them more frequently in other circumstances. Ms Buck: I do not think, Chairman, we necessarily want to add a huge regulatory burden saying every three years. Chairman: I think we had some more questions to ask you about that. Mr Scott? Q400 Mr Scott: Earlier it was raised with us the issue of current planning laws on new build or conversions of, say, a bank into a public house and the problem is that they are not part of the planning process at this moment to do with unloading deliveries, et cetera. Is there any liaison and consultation with, say, the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister on this to try and get these built into future changes in our planning laws? Ms Buck: There is certainly consultation and discussion with the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister in terms of parking and its role in planning guidance overall, absolutely, but it is very, very important that local authorities are taking account of different uses, whether that is commercial or residential, in terms of how they plan for parking, whether that is for freight delivery or for the parking places they make for residents. Some of that is set out in planning guidance and is for local authorities to interpret. Mr Scott: Thank you, Minister. Q401 Mr Goodwill: Where an appeal or, as we have heard this afternoon, a number of identical appeals have demonstrated quite clearly that a local authority has acted illegally, do you think that in those circumstances that local authority should issue refunds to motorists who have been illegally fined? Ms Buck: I am not sure that I am --- Q402 Mr Goodwill: For example if a bay is incorrectly marked and a number of motorists have appealed and their appeal has been upheld for that reason, but there are another 100 or 200 motorists who did not appeal, who just paid up, do you think there is an obligation placed on that local authority to actually refund that fine which has been illegally levied on the motorist? Ms Buck: This is not something that has been put to me. I am not conscious of it. Presumably if that were a regular occurrence it is something that would come through the complaints procedure, it would go to the Ombudsman and the local authority would take account of it. However, I am not sure of the ways in which that kind of issue arise elsewhere for local authorities necessarily to act to reimburse others whom they find in other circumstances. Mr Talbot: I know that there are authorities that certainly do do that if they have made a mistake. Q403 Mr Goodwill: They usually ask people to come forward and that is not quite the same thing as seeking them out and issuing a refund. Mr Talbot: Yes and I suppose there is a balance to be struck in terms of both the public funds being used and the amounts of money involved, but essentially it is for the authorities - they are statutory bodies, responsible bodies - to act according to their statutes. Ms Buck: I think unless required to do so through the legal process, and I am thinking of other areas in which complaints are made against local authorities or an Ombudsman decision is found against a local authority, I am not conscious that local authorities necessarily go out or are obliged to go out and seek others who have been so disadvantaged and to reimburse them. They may choose to do so in some circumstances but there are several local authority ex-councillors and leaders around the table, and as an ex-councillor myself I am not conscious of the fact that that was standard practice. Q404 Mr Goodwill: I will take that as a "yes but, no but"! Just to change the subject entirely, do you think we have adequate provision for overnight parking facilities in this country for freight drivers who have to sleep in their cabs? Ms Buck: I have no evidence in front of me to indicate whether that is the case or otherwise. I do not know whether Mr Talbot is aware of that but it is not an issue that has been presented to me. Mr Talbot: I know that there are concerns about the amount of facilities for drivers of freight vehicles. I know colleagues in the Highways Agency have been looking at what can be done to help provide for that within the bit of the network for which they are responsible. Q405 Chairman: If we could ask you one or two questions just to wind up because we do not want to keep you too long. The British Parking Association thinks it would be a good idea to have a Parking Regulator. Have you considered this? Ms Buck: We do not see any argument at the moment for introducing an additional tier of regulation into parking. Q406 Chairman: Is it a good idea to allow people to park on pavements outside the London area where it is illegal? Do you intend to look at pavement parking? Ms Buck: It is certainly not a good idea. Q407 Chairman: Do you intend to look at pavement parking across the country? Mr Talbot: We have looked at pavement parking across the country, as I said earlier, but it is difficult to legislate for a blanket ban. Q408 Chairman: If it is difficult for the disabled to get along roads because people park on pavements inside London, why should it not be difficult for people outside London? Mr Talbot: All I am saying is that it is difficult to have a blanket ban across the country in the way that there is a blanket ban across London. There is the possibility for authorities outside London to ban pavement parking and to enforce it if they have got decriminalised parking enforcement powers. Q409 Chairman: You would not use that for anywhere else? Ms Buck: If there are local authorities that are not currently in the decriminalised parking enforcement system who regard that as a particular problem, then by coming into the decriminalised parking enforcement system that is something to which they would be able to extend their powers. Q410 Chairman: Do you suggest to local authorities that they use the benchmarking service provided by the Transport Research Laboratory? Mr Talbot: We have not promoted that specifically. Q411 Chairman: Would it be a good idea since it is a very accurate way of looking at what is happening? Mr Talbot: It is closely linked to the model contract that we worked with the BPA to develop, so we would find it difficult perhaps to promote a particular benchmarking one because it is a private company. Q412 Chairman: Although it is an independent benchmark? If you do not want to do that, what about saying that you would like to establish a national database of blue badge holders? Ms Buck: The blue badge holders provisions are under review and we looking to introduce --- Q413 Chairman: So do you intend to do something to make sure that they cannot be abused? Ms Buck: We are currently preparing a provision along those lines and we will be consulting on it. Q414 Chairman: Are you looking at the whole question of the Innovation Fund in relation to many of the things that we are asking you about this afternoon? Ms Buck: The Transport Innovation Fund can, of course, encompass parking strategies and indeed it is very important that it should do so. Things like park-and-ride and workplace parking schemes and other use of parking provision, particularly in high-demand areas, are a really important part of demand management, and the pilot money that is coming forward now is encouraging authorities to look at ways in which they can deal with demand management. In some cases it will be around the congestion charging/road pricing model; in some cases it will be looking at parking provision, so yes. Q415 Chairman: Do you not put the whole question of parking controls and management at the bottom of your terms of review in what is necessary for a successful bid? Ms Buck: I suppose something has to come bottom. Q416 Chairman: Yes except one could say --- Ms Buck: In any list there is always going to be one at the bottom Q417 Chairman: It could have indicated your idea of priorities, do you not think? Ms Buck: No, there is a list of priorities. I think that is reading too much into it. If we took parking and put it top something else would come bottom. I do not think it is fair because I am actually very clear and I think it is coming through from local authorities that the road pricing/congestion charging element on the one hand and parking strategies on the other are absolutely at the heart of what demand management is going to be about and very much the kind of things that the DfT is looking for. I think in practice, regardless of where it stands on a list, it really is a high priority. Q418 Chairman: Have you weakened the requirements for local transport plans to include detailed parking strategies in your second round or strengthened them? Ms Buck: I am not sure that I would choose to use either of those words. I think that local transport plans are expected to look at the whole range of transport provision in their local area and that as we are into the second wave of transport plans there are sets of priorities that we encourage people to look at. It does not mean that parking has dropped out. Parking is central to all of this. Q419 Chairman: Finally, can I ask you about something that is very worrying to us. It does seem, and we have taken evidence about this today, as though the Department in this new set of strategy documents is moving away from very clear, very easily understandable, straightforward recommendations to a great many more "strategic" discussions that might not have been so easy to understand. Do you regard it as the responsibility of the Department to make the attitude of the Government towards proper traffic control clear to local authorities? Ms Buck: Yes, absolutely, I think that is intrinsic to the Traffic Management Act and that will be very clear in both the statutory guidance and in the regulations. Just to go back to where I started, a lot of parking enforcement works well and the local dimension of it is very important. The intention is not to pour minutiae in terms of requirements on to local authorities, but it has got to set some clear guidance. Q420 Chairman: But there has got to be some clear set of parameters, has there not, because most of us understand the difference between detail and making it clear what the hell they are talking about? Ms Buck: Indeed, and I am confident that the guidance and regulations that will come out, which will enact amongst other things parts of the Traffic Management Act, will be clear and will require local authorities to ensure that their parking enforcement is a key part of their transport policy and that that enforcement is fair, reasonable and proportionate. Chairman: On that joyous note, Minister, may I thank you and Mr Talbot most warmly for your evidence. The Committee is adjourned. |