Station Parade - Willesden - Unlawful use of cctv

 

Miss B stopped in the taxi bay in mid March 2026. Mr Mustard does not approve of that, not even for a minute. The sign says 'No stopping' so 2 seconds is enough to commit a contravention.

Had Miss B been issued with a PCN by a 'traffic warden' on foot he might have told her that he is too busy with work to assist (which is true, he still has over £5m to collect on his latest work assignment so arguing over your £160/£80 PCN is not a good use of his time at present) but Brent Council sent a PCN by post relying on cctv. Mr Mustard knew that was unlawful and so he acted.

Mr Mustard did three things:

1. He made formal representations against the PCN on 25 March 26. 

2. He made an Information request to find out how long and how much this had been going on.

3. He sent an email to the monitoring officer, the council official who is responsible for ensuring the council follow the law.

#1 For this type of PCN a council must reject representations within 56 days or they have accepted them by default. Mr Mustard checked the on line balance every week or so. On 12 May it was still £80 and the finishing line was fast approaching. On 21 May, day 56, the balance had been set to £zero. Hurrah. Brent did write to Miss B saying they had missed the deadline but that was a tactical move, to not admit they had erred in the first place.

#2. The information was supplied on time.

 

As the error was spotted so quickly by Mr Mustard no PCN had reached the tribunal or a bailiff. 

On the face of it that is only about 3 people a week getting caught, pretty good compliance on the whole. However, the cctv only started on 6 March and ceased on 3 April so that was about 6 motorists a day getting caught. If you are not in a proper London black cab stay out of these bays, they are not for you.

#3. Nothing had come back from this official by mid-June but they may have been off sick, the out of office response not being 100% clear. Someone else should be covering. Mr Mustard was wondering about an email to the Chief Executive when the explanation arrived on 19 June.

This is an excellent response. The council could have acted slightly quicker as Mr Mustard pointed out the grave error on 23 March. Putting that aside the council have still moved reasonably swiftly and most things in councils aren't rapid. They agree with the legal analysis, they have stopped acting unlawfully, they have cancelled all unpaid PCNs and they have refunded all payments received (some of which will be from lease or short term hire companies and those companies should pass on the refund to the client and cancel the administration fee). You cannot ask for much more than that.

Well done Brent Council (they don't like Mr Mustard much as he keeps putting them to the sword at the tribunal but Mr Mustard doesn't care) thank you for your corrective actions.

Miss B had donated to the North London Hospice at the beginning.

The end.

Brent Council - lawbreakers

 

Mr Mustard apologises for the recent dearth of blogs but he is busy earning a crust and is therefore rejecting the vast majority of requests for help with a PCN and not writing much on the blog. A few years ago the backlash against big brother cctv enforcement was felt by the government and they curtailed the widespread use of cctv to punish every perceived contravention. The law is now as set out above in the Statutory Guidance of the Secretary of State.

Last month a motorist came to Mr Mustard with a PCN and given the circumstances he decided to fight it. The driver had parked up for a few minutes in the taxi rank and there was no excuse, taxi ranks are for black cabs and Mr Mustard is in favour of them so please get off their ranks. However, he is even less fond of money-grubbing councils so the motorist got some help to fight the PCN and guidance about their future parking.

Here is a section of their PCN:

The camera isn't obviously sited, it is the other side of the road behind a tree, so much for the idea that cctv surveillance is to encourage compliance, this one is to maximise income.

Brent Council are still thinking about the challenge that was made a month ago, and their 56 days in which to respond are rapidly ebbing away but here it is, short, sweet and utterly devastating for the council:

The council is not empowered to issue PCNs in a taxi stand using cctv, a CEO in person must be at the location. The PCN has been issued unlawfully, please cancel it

Obviously this couldn't be a one off error, someone has authorised the installation of a camera for the purpose of issuing PCNs in what is, in fact, an illegal decision. Mr Mustard thought he had better find out how profitable the camera was so he asked some simple questions by FOI which worked well and here are the responses:

Gosh, Mr Mustard was quickly on to this, it only started on 6 March 26.

Mr Mustard has today emailed the Monitoring Officer for Brent Council whose statutory duties include ensuring that the council follows the law. Let's see how long it is before he receives a response.

Mr Mustard thinks that it would be better that instead of asking a council to police itself, when it is hungry for revenue, that an external independent Ombudsman would be more effective at controlling the rapacious instincts of councils (and private parking companies) when it comes to the issue of PCNs which are a failed system in terms of controlling parking & driving but a massive success in terms of profit making for councils to shore up their pressed finances. Over 9m council & TFL PCNs are issued in London each year, they just aren't working to prevent contraventions.

To be continued. 

 

Why aren't pedestrian zone permits automatically issued to residents?

 

Hawkshead Road in Brent is a short one way road which probably doesn't see much traffic most of the time, due to its location. It is a one way road and because of the school a limited hours restriction on entering is in place.

To park you need a permit.

Here is what the entry now looks like.

Mr Mustard would probably have run an inadequate signage argument due to there being only the one sign, the foliage and the too late set back position but that probably wouldn't work for a resident who has passed it numerous times.

The reason Mr Mustard came across this restriction was because there was a council v council punch up at the tribunal and Mr Mustard always likes to see how good the council is at taking it considering how much they dish out. Not very good usually. Here is the decision.

 

 

Some adjudicators allow an Appeal when the resident has a parking permit because they might think that entitles them to drive home to access the relevant parking bay, not so in this case and that is a correct decision if one strictly applies the law, which is, of course, the task the adjudicator is charged with, to apply the law.

There is no doubt that the driver was entitled to a permit (he/she must use the same vehicle everyday, if they had pool vehicles this would be unworkable).

The obvious question (for other residents with their own registered cars rather than work vehicles) is why every resident in the affected road is not automatically issued with a pedestrian zone exemption permit for as long as they live in the road. After all, the council know who they are, where they live and their vehicle registration. They could easily issue pedestrian zone permits to known residents and prevent them from being penalised for not having a free permit to which they are absolutely entitled.

It wouldn't be the massive income stream would it? Perish the thought.

The end.

Brent Council as blind as Ealing

This blog also concerns Miss M. This parking contravention happened on the same day as the driving one. It seems that the offending motorist has either learnt how to park and drive or has moved on to another numberplate.

Here is the car parked up. Clearly not a Mini but the traffic warden won't know what it is meant to be.

However, as soon as Brent Council had the DVLA data they knew the vehicle they had ticketed was not a Mini and should not have sent a Notice to Owner.

 

It looks like Brent's traffic wardens move about on e-bikes. They will drop out of the sky even faster when you stop, just for a minute, on double yellows. Don't do it.

I note that the photos taken by the traffic warden do not include one of the VIN which would have enabled Brent to check the true identity of the vehicle and report the perpetrator to the police. An opportunity missed.

Mr Mustard made the formal representations.

Brent didn't mess about. They cancelled the PCN.

Mr Mustard asked some process questions and had less than satisfactory answers.

Quite simply, Brent Council's checks are inadequate to be sure that they have the correct vehicle. If you can't tell a Mini from a Ford estate you aren't look properly.

The end.

A beetle drive in Brent

 

There is always something interesting coming up on the PCN tribunal register.

 

Why on earth was this classic VW beetle targeted for removal, a task which involved 4 two department heads and 4 police officials. There is more to this than meets the eye.

The end.

Dumped on by Brent Council

 

Oh dear, boxes dumped in Brent, outside 226A Chapter Road, NW2 in fact. The name and address on them is an address within NW11 in Barnet.

You can guess what happened next. A Fixed Penalty Notice to a Mr Spring (not his real name).

This came with a lovely invite for a chat under PACE, the Police and Criminal Evidence Act.

 

 

Mr Spring hadn't dumped the boxes, he didn't know anything about them, other than the fact that his name and address was on them, as he hadn't purchased the mattresses, they were purchased by a family member and when they were delivered he was abroad. He contacted Brent Council and thought the matter would quickly be resolved (not when there is money involved!):

 

"The photographs show that the incident in question relates to a delivery that was made to my house in my absence. I was out of the country at the time and another family member was present to take delivery. We paid to have the packaging taken away (see attached email) so did all we could to discharge our Duty of Care. We could not have expected the waste to have been dumped illegally. I would therefore respectfully ask that the Fixed Penalty Notice is cancelled."

 

This wasn't quite accurate but understandably so. The buyer didn't pay to have waste removed as Eve, the mattress people, were actually paid to remove the old mattresses. If they were dumped they don't carry your name and address.

 

In fact, the boxes never entered the delivery property, as they were brought in like this, only in the plastic.

 

Did Brent listen to reason? No, of course not, this is all about the money.

The underlining is by Mr Mustard.

Mr Spring is not the owner of the waste. It never entered his property.

Waste being connected to you doesn't mean that it breaches this law.

The waste was not produced on the property occupied by Mr Spring.

 

The response is a blind, it bends the facts and is only intended to bully a resident into paying £120 (or £200 later on) rather than risk going to the Magistrates' Court and getting a criminal record. The chances of that happening to Mr Spring are very low indeed (Mr Mustard is not a lawyer but just look at the facts for yourself) as he wasn't even in the country when the delivery was made and he didn't place or pay for the order, a fact that he hasn't yet told Brent Council but they can read it here as the blog will be tweeted to the council and the CEO.

 

Of course it doesn't help that Eve has since called in the Administrators as they had financial problems and Bensons for Beds are now selling Eve mattresses but won't be liable for their debts. If anyone dumped the boxes it was the delivery company, which is usually a contracted out service (The 2021 Annual Report says that Eve Sleep operated an 'outsourced manufacturing and fulfilment model'). What Mr Mustard surmises happened is that the delivery company got to the next delivery, put the boxes on the pavement whilst they got the next delivery out then simply forgot to pick them up. Whatever happened Mr Spring is innocent.

Before starting a Magistrates' Court case the legal department of the council will put Mr Spring on notice and at that point a proper lawyer, without an interest in the outcome, and with a duty to assist the Court, should look objectively at the facts, which can be backed up by paperwork, and sling this FPN into the rubbish (and then hope the council disposes of it properly otherwise the whole merry-go-round will start again).

 

Oh dear, Brent Council have form for their actions on dropping litter, see this article.

https://www.kilburntimes.co.uk/news/21960854.brothers-two-year-battle-brent-council-litter-fine-not-vexatious-says-ico/

 

End.

Update: 9 November 2022

 

Before the pro bono lawyer (always very busy helping the public for free) had read all of the papers the council had decided yesterday to cancel the FPN. This was after they had been emailed proof that Mr Spring was out of the country and wasn't the buyer. Their cancellation was not gracious, the writer probably spent the afternoon crying over the loss of revenue, it included these words:

Thank you for your email and the extra information that you have provided.

Based on your version of events, I have decided, on this occasion, to cancel the fixed penalty notice.

Mr Spring's version of events is the truth as demonstrated by independently produced documentation. 'On this occasion' as if he has ever littered before and it will be a decade before he needs a new mattress.

Councils could be more gracious when an innocent member of the public is being written to. The lack of good manners which is often evident in parking departments is equally apparent here.