A costly bank statement

 

Mr Mustard had his attention drawn to this tribunal case by another expert. Both play with a straight bat with the tribunal as anything else would undermine your future credibility. Mr Mustard has accidentally said things which turned out not to be true and if that comes to light he puts his hand up during the hearing to admit he was wrong and to explain why or even in a later hearing with the same adjudicator. That is why his unsupported word as to facts can be accepted.

Not so in this case. One problem for the motorist is that if there were a league table of enforcement authorities and their diligence with PCNs Camden Council would generally be in the top 3.

The initial Appeal hearing did not go well for the motorist (often in the Court system an Appeal is against an earlier Court decision but in PCN circles it is an Appeal against the council's refusal to cancel).

The payment was thought of as a user error. The story could have stopped there with £160 to be paid. The motorist decided to ask for a 'Review'. These are rarely granted as that is how the system is designed because one hearing is proportionate to the penalty at issue. That hearing went badly for the motorist.

A back pedalling motorist isn't a good look. It looks like a narrow escape to me. Camden Council however, had done a lot of work and although costs are, by law, rarely awarded, they had put a lot of work in and wanted a contribution. There therefore had to be yet another hearing and the motorist was still keen to be heard:

The motorist's behaviour was found to be 'wholly unreasonable' which is one of the legal tests, frivolous or vexatious being the others.

Trying to hoodwink an adjudicator is pretty stupid, they do hundreds of PCN Appeals. They also have to be legally qualified and have been so for 5 years before they are eligible to become an adjudicator, they have doubtless assessed lots of evidence during their careers and won't easily be fooled. Just tell the truth and pay your PCN if you are bang to rights.

The end.

Lack of diplomacy in Westminster

 

One of the benefits of over a decade of PCN fighting experience is that experts get to know arcane information. Mr Mustard knows than an enforcement authority, such as the City of Westminster, has the legal right to suspend parking bays but only for the reasons they write in their traffic orders. Common reasons include people moving home, filming, street events, scaffolding & building works, crane works and the like. Mr Mustard couldn't recall having read an Order which allowed for parking to be suspended so that diplomats could park (presumably somewhere different to usual). It isn't really necessary as they often don't pay their PCNs in any event so they may as well just have been left to park as best they could.

Mr Mustard decided that Miss W wasn't going to be paying the PCN she was given at twenty past midnight, a time when the 9 diplomats were not likely to be in the office in any event. Miss W had been to watch a film, ironically called Predator : Badlands which turned out to be set in Westminster

 

Mr Mustard made the informal challenge on 11 November which was as follows:

The rejection of the informal challenge was issued 8 days later and completely failed to deal with the only argument that had been made:

This is a typical method of trying to fool the public. Write a load of stuff which is true but irrelevant, sophistry in action but not sophisticated and it gets nowhere with Mr Mustard. In fact it helps him as the legal duty on the authority is to consider the representations which were made not ones which were not made.

Mr Mustard asked Miss W to trust him and to send him the Notice to Owner once received. She did so after it was issued on 6 January. On 9 January Mr Mustard made the formal representation.  All Mr Mustard had to do was change the heading from 'Informal challenge' to 'Formal Representations' and change the date at the bottom, the content of the representation was identical.

The rejection was slightly different and went on for longer but it still dodged the only argument that had been raised:

 

Mr Mustard and Miss W swapped some messages:

Mr M:  Had a few minutes gap at work so read the letter. Westminster have not answered the only point I made which is that they have not given themselves the right to suspend a space for diplomats so I would hope to win at the tribunal but can't guarantee it. If I lose the 50% discount goes but I think as a principle we should fight. I do all the tribunal paperwork.

Miss W: Ah okay hmm if you think it’s worth a shot let’s go for it. Have you come across a case like this before do they normally get thrown out?

Mr M:  This is a first but that may be because not many people fight back like I do. I often create new Appeals that are revolutionary and then followed by other experts and vice versa

Miss W: Thanks. I’m open to fighting it, but realistically what do you think the chances are? I just want to weigh that against losing the discount.

Mr M: Chances are 90% win.

So off we went to the tribunal on 12 February 2026. This PCN had moved pretty rapidly through the process.

Grounds of Appeal: The Notice of Rejection contains nothing in response to the argument that the council had no legal right to issue the PCN. That is a procedural impropriety.

There is currently a delay in obtaining a hearing at London Tribunals which is being worked on but Mr Mustard doesn't mind, it gives motorists time to save up in case they might lose. The hearing date set was 10 August 2026.

Miss W had a good attitude: Thanks, I’ve never seen this process before so quite interesting to see it unfold. Appreciate it!

Mr Mustard missed it at the time, as he has 50 tribunal Appeals running concurrently but on 10 June the City of Westminster decided to throw in the towel.

The Council no longer wish to contest this appeal and the PCN has been cancelled.

Mr Mustard surmised that they didn't want a tribunal decision against them on this point as although it isn't a precedent it would make their position precarious for future cases and that they will carry on suspending bays for this reason and issuing PCNs unlawfully.

There was no traffic management purpose to this PCN it was a pure revenue raising tool. Justice has been served. Westminster lost £32 on this (the approximate tribunal fee).

The end.

Hapless Havering (Council)

 

This adjudication decision from London Tribunals (case 2250674991 & heard on 17 June) is, although couched in polite terms, a proper telling off.

Now as it happens Mr Mustard represented this same client the week before for the same weight limit at the same location (one visit to erect scaffolding and one to dismantle it explains the two visits) and the same thing happened to that PCN, a Charge Certificate was generated after the balance had been increased to £240 (although in the previous case not actually posted but that is another story) whilst a tribunal decision was pending as Havering have programmed their computer to send a Charge Certificate on day 29 which in normal times is too soon as the motorist gets 28 days from receipt in which to act and although 2 days are made as a service allowance Mr Musatrd posted an important letter to his solicitor and that took 8 days to get to Godalming from Barnet.

Mr Mustard knows that other experts are also experiencing the same Charge Certificate probably particularly with Havering but also with other councils, probably ones who rely on the same software or outsourcer.

What this experience tells you is if you have a Notice of Rejection from Havering Council which doesn't offer you the 50% discount you might as well go to the tribunal even if your case is hopeless as havering are hapless and will probably mess up. Just look how they were described

- Wholly improper

- Unlawful

- Oppressive

A local authority should be ashamed to be described in this way and holding an enquiry to fix where they are going wrong. However, they are too busy raising revenue to stop and do that, probably.

The end. 

 

 

Redridge Council - not as smart as they think they are

 

Mr Mustard has met Redridge Council a few times. They are not the smartest operators in PCN enforcement. They lose to the public 63% of the time at the tribunal and 86% of the time to Mr Mustard.

Mr M knows Mr X. He is the smartest and hardest working of PCN fighters. Redbridge must have heard of him. They should have seen the writing on he wall earlier.

The problem is this case is one of assumption, that a PCN will arrive in the post in two days. It is a rebuttable presumptuion, it might take a week and only the recipient can say the date on which it was served thus rebutting the assumed date of service. Smart councils build in a few days of leeway into their software before going to the next stage. Redbridge are not such a council.

The LGO don't know the law. A PCN is not a fine, they are only issued by Courts.

The LGO was also overly generous in allowing the council to let My Y make out of time representations he having previously been prevented from doing so and a year having passed which causes prejudice and the council having been out of order in the first place. They should have invited Redbridge Council to close the PCN.

Mr M knows that representations were made and the one sensible thing Redbridge did was to accept them. They would have a faced a tribunal hearing otherwise, wasted £32 in fees and been put to the sword by Mr X.

In the last 7 years Mr Mustard has won 19 of his 22 tribunal cases against Redbridge. Here is one which is germane.

That is the same problem as with Mr Y but 2 years earlier.

Clearly Redridge Council are a bit slow to learn................................ 

It can't be the money can it?

The end, until next time. 

Free chances at PCN adjudication - London Tribunals

If you have a Notice of Rejection from a council in London and are unsure of your chances of winning at adjudication then the following statistics may help you make your mind up. Councils bluff all the time and reject challenges against PCNs which they know will lose if an adjudicator sees the arguments so also knowing that most people pay up like lambs the Councils have nothing to fear by rejecting your representation.

There is no cost for the public to go to London Tribunals and the council will have to pay £32 which they never see again. There is a very slim chance of costs being awarded against you if you are vexatious, frivolous or wholly unreasonable. In the year to 31 March 25 there were only 74 awards of costs against the public out of 42,907 Appeals which is 1 in 580 so very rare (as the legislation says they should be). The total awarded was £5,080 so an average of £68 per case.

If the council does not offer the 50% discount in the Notice of Rejection (there is no legal requirement for them to do so) and given that you do not have to pay a fee to go to Appeal at London Tribunals and as the chances of being made to pay costs is almost zero, why wouldn't you do it?

The fact is that many cases are won by default. Here are the statistics for the year 2024/25.

There is a 75% chance that Hillingdon will not contest your Appeal at London Tribunals and so they will have to cancel the PCN. That is therefore the borough that motorists should fight every time. There is only a 4% chance that Greenwich will throw in the towel so you do need a half decent case in that Borough. Overall there is a 26% chance, 1 PCN in 4, that after starting the Appeal you won't have to do anything else.

Looking at your overall chances of winning they are as follows:

You should certainly fight the top 8 authorities in the list every single time as your chances are better than 50/50 and you have a one in four chance against the best authority, Southwark, a borough that has a good team of officers dedicated to attending the tribunal hearings.

To save you time looking here is the alphabetical list.

The meek will not inherit the earth, they will meekly pay out for PCNs which they could beat.

The number of PCNs issued in the year 2024/25 in Greater London was 9,457,848 (thanks to a massive increase in the number of restrictions on driving down certain roads which are still invitingly left open to traffic movement and monitored by cameras) and so the 42,907 PCNs taken to Appeal at London Tribunals is a piffling 0.5% or only one in every 220 PCNs issued.

If the 45% beaten at Appeal is overall representative of whether a PCN was correct or not that is four million PCNs which aren't being over-turned which could be.

Stop giving up people, be like Mr Mustard, learn everything you can about the subject and get stuck in and fight. The more you fight the more you learn and the better you get.

The end. 

Newham Council are Cheats - #50

 

There has been an awful lot of building work in Westfield Avenue and because of this Mr Mustard can't find the exact location using google street view but wonders if it is the one shown in the below photograph

What we see here is a bay adjacent to two live traffic lanes edged with double yellow lines. As Mr Mustard wrote in a recent blog the double yellow lines apply to the bay in which the two cars are placed which appears by the shape to be designed for vehicles. The double yellow lines should not be there.

What Newham Council claimed in this tribunal case was that the location could be used for picking up and dropping off passengers. To do that one would have to stop on the footway, the driver might even have to leave his vehicle to find his passenger. Should Newham Council have wanted the space to be used for that purpose they should have marked out a bay and provided a sign with the relevant rules. Newham Council didn't provide any photographs of signs at the location about setting down: had they done so they would have proved the area was not footway.

Newham Council have got the lines wrong and provided a dubious explanation about the location, as well as designing an ambiguous layout, Mr Mustard thinks they are cheats.

The end. 

Newham Council are helpful - #1

 

The above image is the exit from Gallions Roundabout onto Royal Albert Way. It is quite near to London Docklands Airport and is only restricted (there is a poor image of the 'no entry' sign at the top left) from 10pm to 3am and that was because boy races used to blast up and down the road. Mr Mustard doesn't think this was the optimal solution or if that problem has gone away, as it might have, Mr Mustard goes along the roads very sedately so doesn't inhabit the car meeting world, then the restriction could be removed. 

The main problem with this restriction is that if you normally work days you will see instead a 40 mph limit sign as the sign is digital and so changes. It is also hard to change your mind when you have half exited the roundabout.

Anyway, a 'black cab' driver who Mr Mustard will call Mr White, given his cab colour, make the mistake of driving that way on a Saturday night. He duly received a PCN and challenged it. On 2 July 2025 a Notice of Rejection was generated but did not reach Mr White. The PCN process rumbled on and a Charge Certificate was next followed by an Order for Recovery. Mr White duly filed a sworn Statutory Declaration and the PCN was rowed back to £160.

Newham did what they should then do which was to send a copy of the Notice of Rejection which was not served and invite Mr White to either pay £80 (the 50% amount) or start an Appeal at London Tribunals.

Mr White decided to start an Appeal. He used the verification code he was given of 98G542 but didn't know that contains a hidden date of 2 July. 2+98 = 100 and G is the 7th letter of the alphabet and equals July, the 7th month, the 5 is for 2025, the 4 is the type of alleged contravention and the 2 is a check digit.

That led London Tribunals to reject the Appeal, made within 28 days of the renewed invitation to be thought to be out of time. Mr Mustard suspects that Newham Council hadn't put the tribunal on notice of an possible Appeal, as they should have done or the proper officer at the tribunal could have missed it.

Mr White queried the rejection with London Tribunals and they can't have studied the papers properly as they again rejected the Appeal as out of time. technically having been refused a review the opportunity to Appeal was at an end. At this point Mr Mustard was contacted by a cab drivers' umbrella body and Mr Mustard took over.

He set out a short chronology for the tribunal and explained that a failure to allow an Appeal to be fought would be a miscarriage of justice. The alternative if the tribunal said no a third time would be to start a judicial review but that would cost thousands and would be unfair. The advantage for Mr White is that Mr Mustard is well known at the tribunal for his exacting work and knowledge of the rules so if he says something is going wrong it probably is. To help the proper officer correct their decision he pointed out that Newham Council should have provided a new code, probably 89K512 and thus the tribunal could blame Newham Council and change their mind.

When Mr Mustard hits something going wrong in a blanket way he often emails parking managers. On this case he emailed the man who he thought was the parking manager of Newham Council but he was a manager of only one area which wasn't this one. However, he was a good sort, pointed out it wasn't his job but helpfully passed the email on to the generic email of the team that could help.

All this was going on over the Christmas and New Year festivities when things slow down a bit so Mr Mustard was a bit worried that the PCN might get sent to bailiffs but instead it took a sudden turn to the better.

All that Mr Mustard had asked for was for Newham Council to tell the tribunal that the Appeal was in time. Instead, they looked at the papers and cancelled the PCN. They wrote that there was an error in the 2 July Notice of Rejection. They didn't say what exactly. However, there was something curious which was in the Notice of Rejection. Newham Council wrote that black cabs were exempt from this restriction but Mr Mustard found that odd for two reasons. The first one is that they are not exempted in the traffic order and the second was that the exemption, if it exists, is not on the sign. The same letter also said there were no exemptions.

Mr Mustard doesn't start stupid arguments when things are going his way, he stopped the rot and told the tribunal they didn't need to open an Appeal after all, thus saving Newham Council c.£32.

Well done Newham Council, did the decent thing and saved themselves a lot of time fighting an Appeal based upon their own letter and signage being inadequate.

The end. 

  

Newham Council are Cheats - #47

 

A thorough examination of the evidence by the Adjudicator but Newham Council was all at sea from the start. Every time an on street PCN is issued there should be a number of photographs which show the car registration and the car's position within a bay, the sign which applies and the car with the sign in context. The sign photo within the relevant bay doesn't exist in this case because the sign doesn't exist as the motorist affirmed.

Bog standard cheating by bog awful Newham Council.

The end. 

Newham Council are Cheats - #41

 

Vehicles causing an obstruction can be removed instantly, for persistent evaders or on double yellows the time limit is 15 minutes and from a permit bay the vehicle should not be removed before 30 minutes has expired.

It would be fair and reasonable to not start to remove the vehicle before the 30 minutes has expired as the driver may have been unavoidably detained somewhere (doctor or dentist for example) and as removal is a draconian remedy a council should not rush to remove but this is Newham and although in the east of London it is like the wild west.

The photographs that Newham Council place on their website are not date and time stamped. If you want the times make a subject access request by email to InformationRightsTeam@newham.gov.uk Include proof of your identity (driving licence or passport and proof of address (a recent utility bill) quote the PCN ref. and say you want to know the times of each photo. If the council get enough requests they might decide to stop hiding the information online.

The contravention did occur so the 50% paid for the PCN was not ordered to be refunded but that is a useful £200 refunded to Mr Harea. The removal fee is now £280 so be careful.

Newham Council broke the law, that is cheating.

Newham Council are Cheats - #30

 

'Traffic wardens' shouldn't be wandering onto private land to issue PCNs, that may be a trespass. 

Here is the location as it probably is today

The council's remit extends only as far as the fence line which, despite the absence of a fence, is the edge of the pavement, where the broadband cabinet is.

This is what it used to look like

The cheating never stops in Newham.

Newham Council are Cheats - #2

 

Newham Council removed this car to the pound. Google street view is dated but there are lots of bays without signs at this location. If there isn't a sign alongside the bay in which you are parked the rules have not been communicated to the motorist and no PCN should have been issued, let alone the car removed.

Newham Council are penalising innocent motorists instead of catching vandals who damage or remove signs. They need to start dealing with criminal behaviour and stop issuing unlawful penalties.

The motorist did well to produce better evidence than the council. Clear photos from all angles showing the lack of signage is all you need.

The end.

Newham Council are Cheats - #1

 

Mr Mustard has come to the conclusion, based upon evidence of the PCNs he has fought this year in Newham, that Newham Council are serial cheats. The above decision by a highly experienced adjudicator, a qualified lawyer, an expert in signs, is the first decision of many similar ones which Mr Mustard is going to show you many of which won't be ones that he fought.

It flies in the face of a decision by the Local Government Ombudsman in which Newham Council admit that (obviously legible) signs have to be in place in order to issue a PCN.

That decision is here.

What traffic wardens often do is to take a photo of the CPZ (controlled parking zone) entry sign (which don't apply to bays) or a photo of the sign from the next bay (which may have different rules) or one from across the road, which never applies although could by coincidence have the same rules.

Councils always have to prove their case and fail surprisingly often, at least they do when Mr Mustard puts them to proof.

The end. 

Fun at the PCN tribunal

Mr Mustard appears at the tribunal for 100 to 200 PCNs a year. PCN arguments can be a little tedious sometimes (any adjudicator reading this will probably say that is true of Mr Mustard's arguments). Pity then the adjudicator, who is an independent and qualified lawyer, who does one Appeal every 45 minutes all day. They must have some fun where they can find it, as here.

 

Look out dudes if you are about to appear as a defendant in Willesden Magistrates Court, Mr Walsh has just been appointed to the role of District Judge in that Court.

The end. 

Horrible Havering

 

The PCN from the above is an extract was a pretty standard document. What wasn't standard was the state of the yellow box at the point at which the allegedly contravening car entered it.

It is impossible to commit a yellow box contravention (entering and stopping die to a stationary vehicle) if there isn't another vehicle in sight! That didn't stop Havering, they must have hoped the motorist would be a mug, far from it, he knows Mr Mustard.

Three seconds later, this was the scene 

Still not another car in sight, still not a contravention, the car is clearly stopped so that the words on the yellow sign can be digested.

Mr Mustard made the formal representations which said this.

When the situation is patently absurd no point in writing lots of words as surely the most inept council officer will realise an error has been made?

Apparently not! 

Mr Mustard didn't hesitate, he started an Appeal at London Tribunals. 

That was on 11 April.

The hearing was listed for 25 June.

On 12 June Havering Council realised they were in for a bruising and cancelled the PCN.

Their ability to decide whether a PCN has occurred is inadequate unless of course it was their computer which decided in which case it needs reprogramming.

The decision to reject the representation was made by a complete nincompoop.

The only goods news to come out of this is that the North London Hospice will get £65 which is the sum Mr Mustard bet the motorist that the Appeal would be won.

If Mr Mustard wins the motorist pays the £65 to the Hospice not to Mr Mustard.

If Mr Mustard loses he pays £65 to the motorist make up for the lost discount.

Mr Mustard rarely pay outs as he rarely loses when he offers this deal, at his own discretion.

The end 

Barnet Council - pursuing a trifling matter

 

A pragmatic decision by the adjudicator which Mr Mustard will save to bring out in the future if he meets another case with similar facts. Councils try to punish motorists for really minor errors, this one with a penalty of £80. The adjudicator has stopped their cunning plan by bringing into play the long established doctrine of 'de mininmis non curat lex'. Courts don't use Latin so much these days but it roughly means that the law is not concerned with trifling matters.

Barnet Council should have exercised their discretion, at least the first time, but money talks. This time the motorist paid nothing and the council wasted c. £30 in tribunal fees.

The end.

Being 'cute' turns expensive

This kitten is cute.

This multiple PCN decision, number 2240371472 amongst others, is cute for the enforcement authority ('EA') the London Borough of Southwark, but not for the Appellant.

 

The hire company are 14 times £130 down = £1,820 which they will have to try and recover from Mr Clarke.

There is little for Mr Mustard to say about this mess and he has seen a hire agreement which one of his client's definitely didn't sign, hire companies can easily transfer a digital signature to another agreement.

The signature being different can sometimes be explained by how it was signed, Mr Mustard can't manage a real looking signature on the Royal Mail hand-held device so tends just to put a squiggle.

Ambiguity is in law usually construed against the causer which would have left this hire company in difficulty in any event.

Adjudicators are all legally qualified and bring to the tribunal their experience in other branches of the law. You aren't going to pull the wool over their eyes in a hurry.

The end.