 |
 |
None of us like getting a parking ticket... so why does the Council Issue them?
March 23, 2005 10:20 AM
Councillor Steve Hitchins, Leader of Islington Council, explains why Islington has
parking controls
"Forty years ago, anyone with a car could park it in the road. But since then, the massive growth in the number of cars on the roads, means that there are simply more cars than there is space for them to park. The Council didn't create the problem - but the law now says the Council has a duty to manage parking locally.
Here are some key points about parking in Islington:
Our main priority is to help residents park near their homes. We also have a duty to ensure that cars are parked safely, and are not causing an obstruction. This is why we have parking controls. We don't have parking rules in order to make money - this would be illegal. The money raised from parking income goes on running the parking service, and on providing the Freedom Pass giving free public transport for the elderly and disabled; also some other transport projects. If we did not receive this money, the average Council Tax (Band D)would have to rise by £70. The figures are published annually in the Council's accounts, and Islington receive less money from parking than Camden and Westminster Councils. Our contractor (NCP) enforces the rules impartially - if people park illegally, then they will get a ticket. Parking attendants do not have discretion - if they did it would make them targets for attacks, lobbying and bribery. As with all services, occasionally mistakes do happen: we urge anyone who thinks they have received a ticket wrongly to appeal to the respected independent appeals service. In fact less than 1% of tickets issued are appealed in this way - and we fine NCP for any tickets that they issue wrongly. We accept that in the past the Council has not always given the best service to those who have received parking tickets - for example, many people have had to wait too long for a response from us. But we have now improved this, and are working hard to continue to improve our service further. We have already introduced a range of measures to make the system better - from giving free parking permits to blue badge holders (people with disabilities), to marking bays more clearly including colour-coding them (although we do have a problem that the law does not allow us to make the wording of the signs clearer). We've also increased the number of
visitor permits - and are always looking for further improvements to make. We have also taken a range of other measures to help local people and businesses - including installing short stay pay and display bays in shopping areas like Essex Road - in that case, in the teeth of strong opposition from Transport for London. NCP Parking Attendants do NOT have incentives to issue more tickets. Other boroughs have done this but we have never had such a scheme in Islington. As with all Council services, we do monitor how they are doing, and if no parking tickets were issued, NCP would not be doing what we pay them for. But the parking attendant in the street gets no more pay or other benefits from issuing more parking tickets. In fact we penalise NCP for any tickets that they issue wrongly - so they have an incentive to get it right. The level of parking fines is not set by Islington Council, but by a London-wide body (the Association of London Government). We do set the cost of a resident's parking permit - and we have deliberately kept this down to the same level that the then-Labour Council set it at more than 6 years ago (we've also introduced discounts for fuel-efficient cars). Very similar issues that exist in Islington apply across London, and especially inner London. Other boroughs where it is a big issue have still to catch up with improvements we have made in Islington - for example in Camden and Westminster, disabled drivers with blue
badges are not allowed to park. In Islington, they are.
If you park illegally, you will get a ticket.
But most car drivers want to avoid breaking the rules, and it is our job to help them.
What would you like to do next?
-
Subscribe for updates
Follow the party's activity on...
- Twitter:
- Liberal Democrats
- Facebook:
- Liberal Democrats
- YouTube:
- Liberal Democrats