8 Deadly sins

Mr Mustard spots unusual looking decisions on the tribunal register and has a read. Here is one such.

and here is one of the decisions in full

Now lets pinpoint the location:

 

We can see that Brackley Walk is a lane which leads to a narrow footpath and then through to another road. There is a dropped kerb to allow for easy access.

It is clear that cars are often parked there. If the land is private then you need to erect barriers to keep the public out and then the car is safe from being ticketed.

Greed is one of the deadly sins, Barnet Council appear to suffer from it. The eighth deadly sin could be to park your car on the pavement, just don't do it.

Councils can be a bit slow to cotton on. Once three PCNs have been issued for the same thing they clearly aren't a deterrent (Mr S was in any event abroad which probably explains why he had to go down the witness statement route to obtain a tribunal hearing) and become a mere revenue raising measure. £910 of penalties for a B registered car, it might be worth a lot due to rarity value or it might not.

If you do go abroad for more than 14 days the advice of Mr Mustard is to get someone you trust to open your post and send you anything important.

The penalties in this case were reduced to just one at £130 the other 6 being obviously issued to a car which hadn't moved and thus this was patently one continuous contravention. Councils think they can be trigger happy but most adjudicators will blunt their fire.

There has never been another case at the tribunal for this location nor does council data for 2018 - early 2025 show any issued at this location. That would also have given rise to a legitimate expectation argument.

The car was interesting, a Ford Granada from another age. Now exempt from needing an MOT. It changed ownership not long after these PCNs were issued and is taxed.

So remember people, don't be as greedy as a council and don't put a single wheel on the pavement unless it is marked out or signed to allow it.

The end. 

Fat finger PCN relief

 

Another tribunal decision that Mr Mustard only looked at because the location was familiar.

Decent people everywhere will probably agree with Mr Mustard that this is a typical case of a penalty charge too far. There is zero traffic management purpose to this PCN, there was no wish to avoid paying and a PCN of this kind just helps the public to hate faceless council bureaucrats.

What Mr Mustard notices, and the adjudicator may well have done but he usually writes refreshingly short and to the point decisions, is that the letters E and W are adjacent on a qwerty keyboard and that the keyboard in question is a small metal type designed for its robustness not for the efficiency of pressing. With all respect to Mr Wall, who may have a piano player's fingers (at which point someone will tell me of excellent piano players known for their pudgy pinkies) this looks like a fat finger error. 

What Mr Mustard does in this kind of case is to give the council a choice, to accept the challenge and cancel the PCN or to refund the sum paid to park. Of course the greedy swine usually do neither and so hoist themselves on their own petard.

It couldn't just be about the money, could it?

the end.

HR Policy - Phone a friend

Who wants to be a millionaire? consultants to Barnet Council.

looks like a blogger reading an FOI answer

Mr Mustard enquired under FOI about Chas Dowden Solutions Ltd. They have already provided, via Huxley Associates, Mr Charles Dowden to work on HR policy and then all of a sudden more HR Policy advice is needed as is evidenced in the following email exchange:

Emails Sarah Murphy-Brookman / Chas Dowden Solutions Ltd - Barnet Council

Now what this email shows you is that "consultants" regard themselves to be so much a part of the staff that they write emails that are to the benefit of their Limited company using the Barnet Council email system.

This email also shows a remarkably casual way of procuring temporary help. Mr Mustard has seen many documents which talk about the Hays contract which acts as an umbrella for 100 or so employment agencies. It looks like Hays have been done out of some fees and that a new supplier has simply jumped onto the procurement system. There is a rule that more than 25% of a supplier's business should not come from Barnet Council. Chas Dowden Solutions Ltd certainly fail that test.

Item 2 shows that whilst Chas is busy billing £350 a day to Barnet Council he is at the same time going to supervise another consultant whom he has introduced and this supervision is included in the price. Hang on; doesn't that mean that Chas gets paid twice for the time he spends supervising Amanda?

We might as well look at what she was doing. 

Phase	Policies	Ready for LBB sign-off	Sent to Trade Unions
1	Capability Discipline Grievance	22rd October 2010	29th October 2010
2	Absence Management	5th November 2010	12th November 2010
3	Family Friendly Policies	19th November 2010	26th November 2010
4	Time-off	3' December 2010	10th December 2010
5	Equal Opportunities	17th December 2010	24th December 2010
Phase	Consultation		Implemented
1	1st November 2010	30th January 2011	7th February 2011
2	15th November 2010	13th February 2011	21st February 2011
3	29th November 2010	27th February 2011	7th March 2011
4	13th December 2010	20th March 2011	28th March 2011
5	29th December 2010	27th March 2011	1st April 2011
Phase 1	Capability Procedure
	III Health Capability Procedure
	Teaching Staff Ill Health Capability Procedure
	Headteachers Employed in Schools with Delegated Budgets (voluntary aided).
	Teachers Employed in Schools with Delegated Budgets
	Centrally Employed Staff Under Teachers Pay and Conditions
	Teachers Employed Centrally by the LEA
	Misconduct
	Headteachers Employed by the LBB in Schools with Delegated Budgets
	Teachers Employed in Schools with Delegated Budgets
	School Based APT&C and Manual Staff Employed in Schools with Delegated Budgets
	Teachers Employed by the LBB in a Central or Peripatetic Capacity
	Grievance
	Bullying and Harassment
	Grievance Procedure For School Based Staff
	Harassment/ Dignity at Work for Schools
Phase 2	Attendance management processes inc. Fit Notes
	Problem Drinking
	Sick leave and sick pay schemes
Phase 3	Maternity provisions
	Paternity Provisions
	Child Care
	Dependant
	Parental Leave
	Flexible Working
	Job Share
	Adoption
	Adoption and Long Term Fostering Provisions - Teachers
Phase 4	Time off arrangements
	Health and Safety Representatives
	Special Leave
	Trade Union Purposes
	Agreement on Facilities for Representatives of Recognised Teacher Organisations
Phase 5	Equal Opportunities
	Policy Statement
	Management and Staff Responsibilities
	The Employment of People with Disabilities
	Making Reasonable Adjustments for Employees
	Recommended additional work
	Phase 6
	4-28 Jan 2011
	- Identify "missing" policies
	- List all standard letters that need producing to support Phases 1-5.
	- Identify guidance / Desk Aids that are needed to support Phases 1-5.
	- Identify all existing policies that need re-branding.
	- Produce report which provides this information
	Resource needed:- 9 days
	Phase 7
	31 Jan— 25 Feb
	- Produce policies identified and agreed as "missing"
	- Submit for consultation with Trade Union as required.
	Resource needed:- 12 days
	Phase 8
	28 Feb - 1 April
	- Produce Employee handbook to an agreed format, subject to consultation.
	- All policies consistently formatted and branded
	Resource needed:- 12 days
	Phase 9
	4 April —3 June
	- Produce standard letters and Desk Aids for all policies as necessary
	- Support implementation of Phase 1-5 policies from 4 April.
	- Support the review of contracts and offer letters to align to Handbook and revised policies.
	Resource needed:­24 days

The documents arrived as pdfs when they were obviously once word documents (and really should have been excel documents) and this is part of the plan to make information harder to use as one witness to the Justice Committee on FOI remarked. Mr Mustard simply puts the pdfs through a conversion programme.

Phase 9 was not accepted.

Now Mr Mustard looked for the payments for this work. Phases 6-8 cost £7,425 and yet no payments were listed to Chas Dowden Solutions Ltd. Mr Mustard's theory is that the payments have been made directly to Amanda Mays and have been redacted as she is being treated as a self employed person.

There are two problems if that was the approach. 

The first is that the details of self employed business people should not be redacted and they frequently are at Barnet Council.

The second problem is that Amanda has been working under supervision and so she sounds like an employee. It will be a question for HM Revenue and Customs, when they get around to the PAYE compliance check at Barnet Council, as to whether Amanda should have been on the council payroll or if Chas Dowden Solutions Ltd should have deducted PAYE or if she was genuinely self-employed. Let us hope the income has been declared somewhere.

Mr Mustard asked to see the contract for the provision of these services. Here is the terrible answer:

For your information I have attached a copy of the previous contract which is set out across the 3 attached documents and relates to the provision of the services of Amanda Mays for 8 phases of work in relation to assistance on work on HR policies.

The 3 documents were the emails and the spreadsheets ( slightly changed in presentation but accurately copies ) which are repeated above.

So where is there a proper contact which ought to exist in order to comply with Rule 4.1.13 of the Contract Procedure Rules?

- to keep a register of contracts over £5,000, which (1) may be inspected by a member of the Council at at any time during office hours, and (2) will support the annual budget review.

Procurement in HR is not setting not a good example to other departments, now is it?

Yours frugally

Mr Mustard

Cash cow yields to be increased

Yesterday evening at the full Council Meeting item 2.1 is questions to the Leader ( who was absent ) and Cabinet Members ( i.e. the inner circle of Councillors who take the big decisions - if your Councillor isn't one of them then he/she doesn't have much power - think Ikea rather than chippendale ! ). There were 40 questions.

For residents who live in or visit a CPZ there is more bad news. Here is the Q&A for you to read for yourself printed in Barnet Council's corporate colour of "wishy-washy blue".

Item 2.1

Council Questions to Cabinet Members

12 April 2011

Questions and Responses

Question 1 by Councillor Lord Palmer

Can the Cabinet Member explain why in Barnet our parking enforcement officers allow motorists to drive off without being issued a PCN after they have been observed committing a parking offence? 

Why has the legislation allowing our officers to issue the PCN by post, after they have started writing it but after the motorist has driven off not been put into effect? 

I have been informed that ‘’whilst the law has been revised it remains an option that has not been endorsed or adopted by this Authority and as such our procedures or systems do not cater for this aspect of enforcement.”

Answer by Councillor Brian Coleman

Councillor Lord Palmer raises a valid issue and I have asked officers to implement with effect from 15^th April following appropriate training for Civil Enforcement Officers.

So will this make the Borough a nicer place to live in or visit; no it won't. Barnet Council are desperate for money from motorists. Squeeze our teets a bid harder why don't you - cows have a well known habit of kicking out when milked too hard and then you will be sorry.

If you are unhappy about this policy then write to your Councillor. You can find a link here.

http://committeepapers.barnet.gov.uk/democracy/council/listcouncillorname.asp?intSubSectionID=13&intSectionID=9

The Council's time would be better spent in making sure that all ticket machines are working properly, that all signs and lines are correct ( they aren't ) and that they answer the phone in a decent time - it was 20 minutes on Monday. This new policy will simply lead to more appeals ( lines and signs being incorrect, faded or missing is a good place to start ). The parking "service" is already in a mess - try and cut down the number of tickets not put them up. The point of the CPZs is to control parking, not to make £millions out of motorists who overstay by a minute or two.

Yours frugally

Mr Mustard