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. 

 

More PCN statistics

 

Above you will see a breakdown of PCN numbers in London at the start and end of a 10 year period. Mr Mustard will highlight some of the trends in future blogs but if you want to do your own analysis you can find the spreadsheet here.

PCNs in London double in a decade !

Here are the stats taken from Annual reports issued by London Councils, the mouthpiece for councils in London and the body which has various statutory functions.

Bare numbers are hard to follow so here are some charts to make it digestible.

First, a chart of the overall numbers, please keep your eye on the scales on the left as they are all different:

The dotted line is Excel's idea of the trend. Anyone can see they are on a steady upward trajectory apart from the year to March 2021 which is when covid hit.

Next, parking PCNs

Again down in covid when lots of us stayed home

London is getting more built up and that means more people and more cars which will explain some of the increase. The main driver is, in Mr Mustard's opinion, simply the number of traffic wardens on the street or, for TfL, if they added extra cameras on Red Routes, which they have.

Next is bus lanes of which there have been a few new ones over the period:

Finally the main reason for the increase, moving traffic PCNs for stopping in box junctions, not turning in the direction shown by blue arrows, doing U-turns where banned and 'school streets' and 'Low traffic neighbourhoods' which clearly aren't low traffic, they don't stop the unwanted traffic, they just punish it, deliberate and innocent error alike. Mr Mustard suspects that the number of these will drop as Londoners get to know where they all are and change their routes and/or travel times to avoid PCNs.

PCNs are meant to be a deterrent.

Clearly they aren't otherwise there wouldn't be nearly 10 million PCNs a year issued in London. Mr Mustard's clients, or potential clients, have done their best 99% of the time.

Just to get a ball park idea of the money involved let's assume that every PCN is for £160 and that they all get paid at the 50% value.

9,457,848 times £160 at 50% =  £756,627,840

That is money which the government would otherwise have to give councils towards their costs or that they would have to raise through council tax.

Of course, the whole sum isn't profit, there is a massive industry and hundreds or thousands of council staff behind this. 

When he has time away from his day job and the 50 hours a week spent fighting PCNs, he will look at the major costs of Barnet Council to collect their 278,209 PCNs issued in a year.

What is abundantly clear is that PCNs don't work. The stick has failed. We need a different solution.

The end, for now. 

 

 

Hounslow Council - No comment = no penalties

 

Of a morning Mr Mustard makes himself a proper cup of tea, using leaves, and settles down to a quick perusal of the tribunal register for the previous day. When he sees an entry like the one above he is likely to click on one of the entries because it took a long time to decide and because of the multiplicity of PCN.

Mr Mustard is unfailingly polite to all adjudicators and given that Mr Teper is a former head of a Barrister's chambers and sat as a judge you aren't going to get anything dubious past him. Hounslow Council really got this wrong.

Hounslow Council were trying to obtain £3,200 from this lady. As she started 20 Appeals the council have had to pay out c.£600 in fees to the tribunal to hear the cases. Their stupidity and discourtesy in not responding to the tribunal and adjudicator has caused a massive loss to the borough.

This will be a useful decision to quote from in future multiple penalty cases (although not a precedent but merely legally persuasive). 

This is a location at which Mr Mustard has not been instructed although when he went online to view it he found it was near the former Brentford FC ground. This was the signage when the google street car went past

Mr Mustard doesn't have the images or video for the days in question. Whichever way the car came only one sign would be visible as they are angled. You also have to take in a cpz entry sign with standard hours and extra event day hours. By the time you have finished reading that you may miss the 'flying motorbike' sign.

Hopefully Hounslow Council will learn some manners for the future. Adjudicators don't forget much.

Six of the best for a teacher

 

Another random tribunal decision which Mr Mustard came across.

 

The whole point of 'school streets' is to prevent through traffic not to penalise people with good cause to visit the location. There was no traffic management purpose to these PCNs, they are just revenue raisers.

Mr Mustard doesn't think that a council treating its employees in this way is the best way to retain existing talent or to attract other teachers to Tower Hamlets to fill its vacancies.

Trying to cane a teacher for £960 was clearly unreasonable. (There is no guarantee that another adjudicator would take the same decision, tribunal decisions are not precedents but may be legally persuasive although the facts each time may well differ. You can ask another adjudicator to follow this decision).

The end.

Barnet Council issue 162 unlawful PCNs

 Here is the tribunal decision for no. 163

 

(Actually there aren't 162 unlawful PCNs as the ones issued to the motorcycle have, out of fairness, to be subtracted and Mr Mustard doesn't know how many that is but the number of unlawful PCNs must be over 80 and is probably over 100).

As the adjudicator observed the council should have stopped issuing unlawful PCNs and removed the vehicle to the pound. Mr Mustard suspects they didn't bother because they thought a broken down 20 year old van wouldn't sell for enough to cover their costs, which shouldn't be a traffic management consideration.

Mr Mustard recommends you don't leave your broken down vehicle in contravention for 6 months because the stress of 163 PCNs would be too much for most, it is the number that Mr Mustard deals with during 6 months although those are all different so slower to deal with. Far better to get some mates round, move the broken down vehicle by pushing it and then buying them a few beers.

162 PCNs at £130 each comes to £21,060 which is clearly excessive for one parking action. 

It appears that either Barnet Council hasn't got its parking contractor NSL under control or they colluded in this corporate stupidity.

The end.

Trebles all round in Haringey

Mr Mustard's client received an Order for Recovery and when Mr Mustard looked at it he could see that something had gone wrong and he had a good idea what it was.

Mr Mustard can add up and knew that 195 + 9 was not 222, but 204. He also knew that 195 +9 +9 +9 did = 222.

He asked Haringey under FOI to explain what had happened and how many people were affected. They answered fully without trying to wriggle.

There were 512 entries in the list, which is probably the maximum number agreed with the TEC for registration in one go. Haringey have to pay a fee of £4,608 to register these PCNs, many of which will get returned to an earlier stage once witness statements or statutory demands are filed, thus burning the £9.

Having identified the error Haringey Council cancelled the PCN on which Mr Mustard was instructed and as you can read above they planned to refund everybody who paid the bogus amount. Interestingly in the file with which Mr Mustard was concerned there was a note to the contrary.

If you know anyone who had a PCN in Haringey in 2023 you should get them to check the list below and demand a refund by emailing corporate.feedback@haringey.gov.uk (not sure that is the best email for parking but Haringey Council simply don't want you to email them).

 

Haringey Council PCN Court ... by MisterMustard