Proof of Payment is No Defence

Eight months on and it has been decided at the Traffic Penalty Tribunal that having a valid parking ticket is not grounds for appeal. Proof that you have paid is no defence. It was never in dispute that I had paid the parking fee. I have the ticket that the parking attendant photographed. The ticket was not properly displayed and that’s enough.

You would have thought that there were some rules that Councils have to operate by. In fact they have ’Absolute Discretion’. Absolute Discetion means that, provided the parking system is propely in place with proper notices, road markings and the like, then the Councils can do whatever they like with regard to infringements. There is not even a requirement for them to be consistent.

A couple of people in the Tribunal queue with tickets wrongly displayed, dropped of the windscreen or otherwise obscured and I would imagine that they would all have lost their appeals - assuming the Tribunal is consistent.

The reality is that parking provides a considerable income to Councils - and to the private contractors who operate it it for them. They even have targets for income from penalties. Penalties in other areas of the law are designed to act as a deterrent to illegal behaviour so that a sensible target would be to see them reduced. If penalties are seen as a source of income then deterring behaviour that is a source of income is counter productive. It also explains why Councils pursue every infringement to the limit.

In reality, it makes sense to just pay up and accept that you’ve been skinned. Even if you were fortunate enough to win, you lose pay from time off to attend the hearing and preparing your case is not an inconsiderable task. Councils probably depend on people resigning themselves to the injustice of it.

Among the largest number of complaints to Members of Parliament are those about parking penalties. It was even raised by the Liberal Democrat spokesman in Parliament. I contacted my MP and he suggested that I mention "common sense, fairness and justice". I discovered that common sense, fairness and justice have no place in the Tribunal. They have a set of grounds for appeal. If you meet the criteria you win, if you don’t you lose. It’s a rubber stamping exercise and therefore a waste of time appealing if your grounds for appeal is not on the list.