Redbridge Council - a casket case

 

Mr Mustard's attention was drawn by an assiduous reader of tribunal decisions to an unusual set of circumstances in Redbridge which led to a PCN and an appearance at London Tribunals (the home of Traffic Adjudicators for all of London) of a funeral director. Here is the decision in question.

As it happens Mr Mustard has a copy of this Traffic Order as he fought a case at that location about a year ago but still has the evidence pack on his computer. 

This is the information on the Redbridge Council website

The cctv camera is placed at the top of the red line, the same place as the location image at the top of the page.

You can't see the sign clearly so here is a close up

This is what the council website says:

It is therefore undisputed that any delivery provides an exemption.

So, the question was whether the unfortunate deceased person became 'goods' for the purposes of being collected by the doubtless discrete vehicle used by the undertakers for moving bodies. The Adjudicator decided that a corpse is an 'inanimate' item which it clearly is as it means 'not living'.

You may be surprised, shocked or even astonished that a local authority could be so heartless as to reject representations and force an undertakers to the tribunal. That is to overlook the insatiable desire for PCN revenue in many London councils these days. Mr Mustard's view in Redbridge's case is that it is greed combined with incompetence, based upon his previous experience of them.

The undertaker made a fair point about needing to be close by. Mr Mustard has been in a house to find an occupier had died suddenly and once the police have been along to check there wasn't anything nefarious and the police doctor has been to certify the cause of death the undertaker turns up to take care of the body. Undertakers are very good at what they do during a time of distress. Where is the gentleman or lady resting they will ask. Then they ask you to stay in a room out of the way whilst they do their job. Mr Mustard presumes, as he was out of the way as requested, that a coffin shaped box is employed. Whatever is used, a person shaped box or body bag being taken from a residence by two darkly dressed men into a plain van is going to be obvious to all and sundry as to what it is.

That includes children leaving the nearby schools, Gordon Primary School & Nursery or SS Peter and Paul's Catholic Primary, the very reason why entry into this road is prohibited at school opening and closing times, which is c. 3.30p.m. so exactly when this body was being moved. Do Redbridge Council really want undertakers to get a gurney out and trundle 100m up the street past the schools to Green Lanes with a body on board? Apparently so.

Mr Mustard sees a second problem. The PCN says this

In other boroughs, the council look at the time of entry and the time of exit (they do this in Strand on the Green near Chiswick Bridge) and if it is longer than it would take to drive between the entry and exit points at the speed limit they assume you stopped for a good reason, such as delivering a parcel or dropping off a resident. In this case one would expect that the undertaker was on site for 15 - 30 minutes and had the council looked at that and seen the vehicle was a van (a black Ford - probably a Transit - discerned from the registration and a check of the government database) they could easily have believed that loading (or unloading) was taking place. 

In order to issue a PCN a council is required to hold a 'belief' that a contravention has occurred. Redbridge Council could not legitimately hold such a belief. They have set up a system which assumes guilt, despite them knowing the exemptions they themselves specified, and in England we are meant to be innocent until proven guilty. In Redbridge you are guilty until you prove your innocence. That puts an unfair burden onto the motorist of whom 99% don't get as far as the tribunal as many people pay up for a quiet life or aren't equipped for the fight with a faceless bureaucrat. 

Redbridge are making hay, and massive profits, out of an unfair system and sending out illegal PCNs.

The end.