Barnet Council: No, No, Yes

Mr Mustard's client, Mr K, was given a PCN for being 'Parked without payment of the parking charge' which wasn't the case, he had paid but he hadn't got around to displaying when he got waylaid in the street to discuss a pressing matter of business. It might seem pedantic to challenge such a PCN but that is only giving the council some of its own medicine. Had the PCN been for 'Failing to pay & display' then Mr K would have been well advised to pay up at 50%.

So it was that Mr Mustard made the informal challenge in February 17 and sent in a copy of the above payment receipt and pointed out that the contravention, as alleged, had not taken place so the PCN should please be cancelled. 

The reply was only 10 days in coming:

Not the most accurate of replies. Firstly, the bay clearly wasn't for people paying to park by phone or even for people paying by phone to park as otherwise there wouldn't be parking meters issuing receipts. Secondly, Mr Mustard sent a copy of the receipt for parking to support his argument as he knows how councils don't believe anything unless you send them proof.

Mr Mustard told his client to calmly await the Notice to Owner as he knew he was using a winning argument, it was just a question of time. In early April the said Notice arrived. The same day Mr Mustard made the identical challenge to the one he had made in February. Just over a month later (a little slower than usual to respond) a Notice of Rejection reached Mr K. It said:

This was a second act of wilful blindness as Mr Mustard's copy of his formal representations contained an image of the receipt for paying which was 7cm high. Oh well, tribunal time said Mr Mustard.

Mr Mustard duly filed an Appeal at London Tribunals at the end of May. The Grounds of Appeal were that 'The contravention did not occur'. As soon as the Appeal was filed a charge is raised to cover the costs of running the tribunal of c.£30. Last Friday Mr K received a letter saying that Barnet Council would not be opposing the Appeal and thus the PCN is cancelled. These are Mr K's words:

What I don't understand is why they insist on going through the whole rejection route when they must know that they are going to fail.

Mr Mustard knows the answer to that. It is that apathy sets in and/or people believe that the council will be correct, bizarrely even when they are wrong. The public don't understand that you can make the same challenge 3 times, once when you get the PCN on your car, once when you get the Notice to Owner, and a third time when you go to the tribunal. In fact, presenting the same argument three times plays well with adjudicators who see an unchanging argument which is more likely to be true than that you were loading, then you were unloading and then you were dropping off your granny - that is the way to lose.

Mr Mustard knows the system and never runs out of steam. If you are going to fight a PCN prepare yourself to make the same argument three times, stick to the timetable and lodge your Notice of Appeal with London Tribunals (you can do it in 5 minutes on line now) and sometimes, maybe once in every 6 or 7 Appeals, the council will throw in the towel rather than waste the 2 or 3 hours that is necessary to produce all the evidence for the tribunal.

Persistence pays off.

Yours frugally

Mr Mustard

 

Removal of pay & display machines

The day of reckoning is fast approaching. The pay & display machines are to be removed. Here is a copy of their death warrant / delegated powers report authorising their removal.

Who is this Michael Dolan ? On his linked-in page it says he has been the Parking Support Manager at Barnet Council since August 2010. He has also been an Operations Consultant at Capita and he worked with the Mouchel team and is ex NCP so it would be for the best if he doesn't get involved in the proposed outsourcing of Barnet's parking and that someone with absolutely no connection to any of these outsourcers were to be involved ( he may not be ).

1.2 - what is more efficient than being able to reach into your pocket for a £1 coin and putting it into a slot and receiving a little ticket for your car windscreen? Nothing.

2.1 - why are the machines ageing? Because everything ages, even Cabinet councillors ( some more than others ) and why do things underperform, perhaps because of neglect.

Increased footfall in the shops. You must be joking. Occasional visitors will desert Barnet in droves. They already park halfway down the St Albans Road on the way to the A1 in order to avoid paying. 

Improved confidence in the parking regime - which comedian writes this stuff? send him/her to The Edinburgh fringe.

3.1 - A lack of contracts with suppliers - now that does sound like Barnet. But maintenance was mainly in-house so that doesn't wash. Impact on income - now that is the nub of what Barnet care about. 

3.2 - Semi-monopolistic situations tend to thrive.

5.1 - When two tenderers withdrew we didn't bother to try and find two more. How lazy are we?

8.3 - RM Countryside were paid £282,487 in the year ended 31 March 2011. Getting proper quotes from other contractors might have driven the price down.

So removing 408 machines at £128 per machine is considered good value "in comparison with using the term contract and with previous similar works undertaken in the past" ( para 5.2 ). This is the usual sort of drivel that Barnet Council put out. What term contract are they on about? Have there been similar works undertaken in the past? no, not of this scale. To make a comparison to an odd removal or movement of a machine is meaningless. 

This contract looks like very bad value to Mr Mustard. So it will take 2 men and a flat bed lorry a few weeks to do this and RM will make a huge profit. The basis of starting with a unit price which would be reasonable for a few removals and then multiplying it up for 408 of them automatically means that the council will be overpaying.

The report does not say what will happen to the old machines? 

The report does not say how many low timeplate posts will be replaced with regular posts so only the signatory knows whether the price is good value. 

These reports really need to be more informative.

Finally, as Mr Reasonable pointed out a few days ago, £80,000 is being spent on removing something that the residents want to keep. Barnet, as Bonkers as ever.

Mr Musatrd has just been through the procurement Code of Practice. He went to the Barnet Council website to make sure he had the latest version. He has, it is dated March 2006 and is noted as being under review as at December 2008. Going full pelt at that review then Barnet Council! There is a dirty great hole in the policy. It does not say that at least 2 tenders must be obtained. What does Pam Wharfe know about the cost of removing parking meters. Probably not much.

Update 24 January 2012

Mr Mustard has seen an email from the parking manager that says that he wanted to use RM to remove all of the meters but it is against procedure so he can't There was no mention of the council ignoring its own procedures ; only that a new contractor was being sought. Let us hope that the tender process is carried out correctly this time.

Yours frugally

Mr Mustard