On this glorious day when David Attfield won, on behalf of all CPZ residents, his Judicial Review appeal against Barnet Council (and he was well supported and funded by the community) it is fitting that we have a look at another aspect of parking, parking ticket appeals.
Thanks to another enquirer using FOI, Mr Mustard has put together a little table of third stage appeals, to the independent adjudicator at PATAS, and the results.
| Year / period to | Appeals | Won | % |
| 31 Mar 11 | 1222 | 504 | 41 |
| 31 Mar 12 | 941 | 524 | 56 |
| 31 Mar 13 | 2217 | 1571 | 71 |
| 15 Jun 13 | 681 | 395 | 58 |
From which you can see that there was a surge in numbers in the year ended March 13. The curious coincidence is that NSL took over ticket issuing duties on 1 May 12 and final stage appeals have more than doubled since they did so. Mr Mustard would posit that this is thanks to more marginal tickets being issued and less appeals being upheld at the two earlier stages.
The 681 appeals for this year if multiplied up pro-rata to a complete year suggests that about 3,270 appeals will reach PATAS.
As more and more people go to PATAS and find that it is a convenient forum (on the Northern Line) staffed by decent human adjudicators who do try to be fair and that there is a more than evens chance of getting your parking ticket cancelled with no downside (28 days to pay if you lose) then Mr Mustard thinks that the number of appeals will just keep climbing. You can download Mr Mustard's simple guide to the process form the left hand side of the site.
Yours frugally
Mr Mustard
Many decades ago I was once a lawyer. (Yes, many people have a murky past they prefer to forget.) So I will bide my time and wait for the chance to give close attention to the written judgement.
ReplyDeleteBut even if it says what I hope it says, I won't be entirely confident. Hundreds of councils are now hopelessly addicted to their regular parking fine injections. This includes my own Haringey colleagues who depend on their hourly fix of overcharged PCNs - even to mend our streets.
I assume a legal appeal is possible. Or an appeal in private to the Government by London Councils or the Tory boroughs which depend on parking income surplus to keep their council tax lower.
So an amending bill wouldn't surprise me. Perhaps it may not surprise you either?
It's been a lucrative scam. Legalised Highway robbery in broad daylight. Parking accounts making huge profits in flat defiance of the legislation Surely even Sherlock Holmes would doff his deerstalker in admiration at such a perfect crime.
Alan Stanton
Tottenham Hale ward councillor
London Borough of Haringey