Hammersmith & Fulham Council - delay: avoidable & otherwise

 

On 30 June you lend your car to a friend to pop to the chemists for you and they drive this way as they are from overseas, don't know the area very well and have cognitive dissonance when it comes to open roads which aren't open. The blue must go left sign doesn't help.

On 10 July H&F issue a PCN by post. The motorist sends it to Mr Mustard.

On 26 July Mr Mustard makes the formal representations on line. He then watches and waits whilst checking the PCN value each week so he might know if something happens (not a foolproof system).

On 14 November H&F decide to reject the representation. There is a 56 day time limits for parking PCNs but not for moving traffic ones. The council need to act with reasonable expedition.

On 2 December Mr Mustard starts a tribunal Appeal, one of his points is the unreasonable delay (motorists never getting more than 28 days to do anything).

The tribunal set a hearing date of 13 May . At least 5 days before then it is the duty of H&F to provide the tribunal with all of the paperwork. There is a completely redacted email on 2 May about the case but the contents are top secret for some unknown and unfathomable reason.

On 4 May H&F produce the evidence pack. They have to serve it by post on Mr Mustard as he can legally insist on printed evidence.

On 5 May H&F manage to get it into the post.

Mr Mustard was working away from home and so only received it when he returned on Saturday 9 May after a 200 mile drive. Dealing with it had to wait for a short while.

On Monday 11 May he filed the skeleton argument which was certainly faster moving than H&F. What he didn't know about was the emailing going on about him at H&F which has only recently come to light & is a post-mortem of the hearing.

 

Mr Mustard has asked H&F to note that he is not and does not claim to be a solicitor. The complaint that he asks for a PCN to be cancelled if the evidence pack isn't sent to him but to the motorist is because the tribunal ask the Appellant (the motorist) to provide their proper address for service. Naturally and quite properly Mr Mustard uses his home address as most motorists are overwhelmed by 50-100 page evidence packs. That comment by H&F displays their ignorance of procedure and law.

It is wrong that Mr Mustard does not submit arguments. You have to tick a box stating the category of your argument in order to start an Appeal at the tribunal. He does add extra arguments if they arise from the evidence pack, he would be failing the motorist if he didn't. The law allows for that.

At the hearing an employee of H&F started by trying to get the skeleton argument struck out but the adjudicator was having none of it, it being clear it had been produced in very short order indeed. The delay by H&F however, was fatal to the PCN:

 

Finally, Mr Mustard does not look for loopholes as suggested. He looks for mistakes by councils and as H&F abundantly demonstrate, they make loads of them.

If and when he is sent the unredacted internal emails, there will be another blog. Doubtless the emails paint Mr Mustard in as black a light as the redacting ink. 

Havering - a mitigation free zone

 

Blue signs mean 'only' so in this case only buses and cycles may pass the sign. The words 'bus gate' on the road should help motorists to turn around and find another way to the hospital which you can see in the background.

Mr Mustard fell over the tribunal decision at random as he idles through the tribunal decisions most days.

 

Mr Mustard often struggles to convince the public that a council will, when faced with an obviously meritorious claim for kindness (use of discretion) reject it because the overwhelming need is to raise revenue. This is illegal but hard to prove.

Let us look at the decision above.

Firstly note the correct statement that if you fight a moving traffic PCN the discount does not have to be offered again if your challenge is rejected. The discount legally terminates at the end of day 14. There is a trend to not offer it again which is the opposite of what it has been for years. If you are in that situation the tribunal is a free throw of the dice.

Then note that contrary to what the PCN states there are no mitigating circumstances which Havering Council will cancel for. Thus, although you don't know it, every challenge is futile.

Ironically the only grounds they will accept were ones which only came out during the hearing, the driver was following an ambulance, one which contained her father in an emergency situation. If he ambulance driver tells you to follow them you don't choose the route the ambulance will take.

Adjudicators are human beings, unlike the heartless automatons who reject PCN challenges (not all of them but there are plenty as they aren't held to account) and find a way for justice to be dispensed. No need to bend the law to fit in this case Lord Bridge of Harwich had set the scene in the House of Lords decision quoted.

Councils are obliged to have 'due regard' to the Statutory Guidance of the Secretary of State, the relevant part of which follows:

That was another basis on which the Appeal could have been allowed albeit less authoritatively.

In summary, Havering Council are not acting fairly, not proportionate, not sensible nor reasonable and only become so once put on the spot which is at most 1% of the time for challenged PCNs = hardly ever.

Havering Council probably aren't the biggest fans of Mr Mustard given his record against them at the tribunal.

The score is 17-0 to Mr Mustard! (+ 5 other cases where they threw in the towel). Why don't you take your PCN fight to the tribunal against this Council?

The end.

Barnet Council - your number's up

 

Older readers will get the reference to 'come in number x'

This was an odd case although Mr Mustard has now seen a second instance of it in a different borough.

For starters the PCN was for the wrong contravention, it was for code 01 but should have been for code 02 as loading was also banned.

The motorist, Mr D, sent Mr Mustard a copy of the PCN placed on his car windscreen which ended with the numbers 6618. That could not be found on the council computer and so Mr Mustard just kept an eye out to see what would happen next.

A month later Mr D received a Notice to Owner bearing a number ending 6607 for the same set of facts (date, vehicle, location etc).

What you need to know now is that PCNs are issued in sequential series by individual traffic wardens and that the last digit of a PCN is a check digit so the PCNs in this case were 660-7 and 661-8 and thus they had been consecutively issued at the same time.

What had therefore happened was that the traffic warden had decided something was wrong with 660-7 and issued a fresh PCN 661-8 intended to cancel 660-7 but accidentally cancelled 661-8 (or the computer took over and did it).

It was therefore an easy win as 661-8 was never served and Mr Mustard had proof that 660-7 was served.

Mr Mustard made out three arguments in his formal representations to the council.

1    Finchley Road as a description of the location is too vague (the keeper and driver may be different).

2    Loading is banned so the alleged contravention is incorrect.

3    The PCN was not served.

The Notice of Rejection didn't tackle points 1 and 2 and said that the PCN was either placed on the windscreen or given to the driver. It also waffled on about CPZ entry signage which was irrelevant as there was a local sign.

Thus it was an easy decision to start an Appeal at London Tribunals at which time a fourth Ground of Appeal was added which was the Notice of Rejection dated 14 August offered a 50% discount for 14 days from service and 2 days earlier it had already been removed. A council must be as good as their word.

There was no need for a hearing. Faced with an opponent with 4 straight arrows in his quiver the council cancelled the PCN.

The end. 

Newham Council are cheats - #51

 

This sign is unreasonably long.

The motorist managed to interpret it correctly and parked legally.

In the first place that is the wrong contravention as the car was within a bay so the correct alleged contravention would be for parking in a suspended bay.

The council get asked a simple question by the adjudicator and they go silent because they simply cannot prove their case and rather than being honest and admitting what happened they try to ride it out. The ambiguity was settled in favour of the person adversely affected by it, that is normal.

Ionut should never have been issued with a PCN, his car should never have been towed, the council should never have rejected the representations nor should they have opposed the tribunal Appeal.

Cheats, as proven by door bell footage.

Newham Council are Cheats - #48

 

Starting the year with some cheating by Newham Council. 

Barnet Council must be so pleased that Mr Musatrd's eye is elsewhere and that takes the pressure off them but as they don't routinely cheat, just get things a bit wrong sometimes then they don't appear in this blog do often. If Mr Mustard tells the Barnet manager, problems get fixed.

Newham is like the wild west even though it is in the east.

As every bay must have its own sign it is logical that it must also have its own suspension sign. In this case Newham Council clearly failed to erect a sign in each suspended bay and to issue a PCN in such a situation was flat out cheating.

We are up to #48 in this series, will we reach 100 by the end of 2026? Place your bets.

The end. 

Newham Council get their butt kicked

 

At first Mr Mustard thought that the driver had made the classic error of putting half the car on a single yellow and half on double yellows (nearly always a mistake, get your whole car within one type of bay or line) but then having looked at the road in question he found a spot which was as below.

 

 

Logically you can't have two different numbers of lines which apply to the same place in space as they have different rules and the motorist must have certainty. You will note that the adjudicator referred to 'ambiguity'.

Yellow lines are generally held by adjudicators to apply from the edge to the middle of the carriageway therefore they don't apply to the direction of traffic flow but across the road. 

Thus Newham Council should not have painted the double yellow lines along the sides of the built out island but only across the part nearest the gap left for traffic. This was a painting design error compounded by a lack of insight in the parking PCN back office.

The PCN should never have been issued, the representations should not have been rejected, the Appeal should not have been contested.

Will Mr Mustard still be writing about Newham Council not knowing what they are doing on 1 January 2027? 

Sadly, he probably will.

The end. 

 

 

Newham Council - in another world - one you don't want to be in.

 

Mr Goodson (not his real name) received a PCN and thought that it would be quickly cancelled so he made his own representations. He was wrong and so Mr Mustard took over at the Notice to Owner stage. Mr Mustard re-used his grounds as well as adding his own.

1    The PCN was for the wrong contravention. Newham Council did not create a restricted street, they suspended the use of a bay. Councils often get this wrong.

2    The Notice to Owner did not contain a postal address to which to write so was non-complaint 

3    The informal challenge made by Mr Goodson was as follows:

On Sunday 13 April 2025, at 3.25 pm, I had to urgently take my 77-year-old father to the hospital following a sudden episode of rectal bleeding. He suffers from a neurological condition resembling dementia, making it impossible for him to manage hospital interactions independently. I am his primary carer and was the only person available to accompany and remain with him.

Due to this emergency, I was not able to return home before the bay suspension came into effect. At the time of leaving, there was no plan to stay overnight and the decision to stay overnight was only taken due to medical necessity and hospital advice.

The car was parked lawfully in a permit holder space on 13 April. The suspension began on 14 April. When the emergency occurred, I had no reasonable opportunity to relocate the vehicle, and no one else was available at the household to move it.

Please exercise your discretion. A hospital document is attached.

Please cancel the PCN for any of the three reasons advanced above.

Now Mr Mustard rather thought that any reasonable human being would cancel the PCN due to the medical reason being an unavoidable emergency but he was wrong. 

The Notice of Rejection contained the following:

Mr Mustard was outraged by the response but getting mad doesn't help. He had already lined up his arguments to pick apart the obvious flaws in the council's logic (or failure to understand reality) but decided to keep his powder dry and obliterate Newham Council once they had produced the evidence pack and the full glory of their unreasonable position was there to shoot at, so the Grounds of Appeal were short, but carefully targeted:

The tribunal appeal had been made on 1 August 2025 and because of a temporary adjudicator shortage was listed for hearing on 12 November. On 7 November Newham Council suddenly decided they didn't want to fight Mr Mustard at the tribunal and filed a 'Do Not Contest' form and cancelled the PCN because:

Therefore there was no traffic management order when Newham Council rejected the informal challenge. 

There was also no traffic management order when they rejected the formal representations made by Mr Mustard. 

This probably does count as a PCN which Mr Mustard could have written up in the Newham Council are Cheats series but it is in a special category all of its own.

Councils don't think of PCNs as having been issued to a human being, they are just a number PN12345678 etc, just a job to be done and when this one is finished there will be another, another and another.

Mr Mustard has to spend some of his time dealing with the physchological fallout reassuring a motorist that everything will turn out all right (and Mr Mustard is fortunately right 85% of the time).

Mr Mustard was confident, provided he didn't get a green adjudicator who might not yet fully grasp the law, that he would win the day on his wrong contravention argument alone. However, Mr Mustard is the veteran of 2,000 PCN fight in the last 7 years so has all his ducks in a row but the motorist may only have had one or two in that time so doesn't know how strong his case is and motorists are inclined to think that councils must be honest, they may be in other areas but often not in PCNs.

Here is a short exchange of emails:

Motorists should not be put under this much strain by councils who reject what turn out to be perfect challenges. The trouble is there isn't a body charged with oversight of their day to day actions. It is assumed that a council will act fairly as Lord Mustill stated in a House of Lords decision:

Where an Act of Parliament confers an administrative power there is a presumption that it will be exercised in a manner which is fair in all the circumstances.

It is high time a supervisory body was formed to make sure this is the case.

The end. 

Newham Council are Cheats - #44

 

It is evident from google street view that this is a location where signs get damaged and by the evidence of this motorist removed altogther.

Fairly rourtine cheating by Newham Council. There was not a sign in the bay where the car was parked so the 'traffic warden' (CEO / officer) took a photograph of a sign in a different bay, one which unless you are informed by signage as to the rules may well have different ones.

Newham Council must know by now, this being one of dozens of cases Mr Mustard has written about that cpz signage does not set the restrictions for parking bays but only for unsigned yellow lines.

They removed the car to the pound so the traffic warden cheated, the back office cheated in rejecting perfect representations and in opposing the Appeal to the independent adjudicator who wasn't having any of it.

The end but not of cheating at Newham Council.

Barnet v Barnet (except)

Mr Mustard always looks at tribunal decisions when councils are fighting themselves or each other.

What appears to Mr Mustard to be the background motive here is Barnet Council holding Mr Hoskar liable for the penalty. Mr Mustard does not know what his Contract of Employment states.

 

Mr Mustard asked Barnet Council (using the Freedom of Information legislation) for certain sections of the Evidence Pack provided to the tribunal and by the council to themselves. It was quickly provided on the second request, the first one perhaps not having got through on email. Let's go through it.

We start with the original postal PCN

That led to a representation on 18 December 24 that the vehicle was contracted out at the time and a copy of the front page of the Rental Agreement was provided (price redacted by Mr Mustard).

Following that representation liability for the penalty was transferred to Barnet Council. It should not have been.

The first reason is simple. The rental agreement is with Car Hire (Day of Swansea) Ltd which is not the company named on the PCN (albeit it may be within the same group) and therefore has no standing to make a representation.

The second is that liability can only be transferred for hire periods of less than 6 months. This agreement is for 12 months.

Liability could be transferred if there is a sufficient degree of permanence to the keepership by the renter but as we don't have all of the terms of the rental that cannot be established. Mr Mustard lost at the tribunal on that ground when he tried it for a 12 month hire.

Barnet Council therefore erred in transferring liability from CEM to itself.

Had they not done so CEM would probably (it is rare for rental companies to fight the actual contravention) have paid the PCN and charged the council for it along with an admin fee for so doing. The council would then have asked their employee to pay it.

The council duly sent itself a PCN.

The PCN was challenged on 21 January 2025, not by the council, but by the driver despite the PCN saying this:

The word 'Person' includes a Company or Council.

The challenge follows:

The challenge was as poor as the driving but more of that later.

Barnet Council could simply have ignored the unauthorised representations but most enforcement authorities write to the liable party and invite them to confirm the right of the third party or to make a representation in their own name. The council did this on 5 February and 24 February which was generous but they were writing to themselves. It turns out, based upon the part of the file which Mr Mustard holds, that a valid representation was made on 18 February.

 

The council rejected the representation on 3 March 25. On 31 March the council asked itself for more time to pay as Mr Hoskar had been absent on leave and 7 more days were granted on 1 April in which to pay at 50% which was the council being generous to itself. By the end of those 7 days the time limit for making an Appeal to the tribunal had expired.

 

Neither payment was made nor an Appeal started so on 22 April the council sent itself a charge certificate increasing the penalty to £195

 

On 17 May the tribunal accepted an out of time Appeal and thus the penalty reverted to £130. Mr Hosker must have thought he could beat the PCN. By starting an Appeal barnet Council had to pay a c.£40 fee to the tribunal which they don't see again, win or lose.

 

The outcome of the Appeal is at the top of the blog. Barnet Council lost and Barnet Council won, Mr Hosker lost. Now let's look at his driving.

Here is the situation that faced him at the moment of imminent entry to the box:

From his high vantage point the driver could see that traffic was stopped ahead, it often has to stop because of the pedestrian crossing. He should have stopped where he was. 100% he was the victim of his own bad driving choice and ended up in contravention as below:

Look what the car behind him did, he changed lanes and drove to the front of the queue. There was ample time for the cctv van to have safely done the same. A generous description is that the driving was sub-optimal and it wouldn't be unfair to say that it was inept.

The whole case has been a riot of ineptitude.

There don't seem to be as many council v council cases as there used to be but Mr Mustard will report on them when they occur.

Hounslow Council find the end of the road

 

Car drivers are in the habit of finding every possible extra parking space. This location is one that ended up at the tribunal where the PCN was cancelled for the simple reason that the alleged contravention had not occurred. The mistake the traffic warden (CEO) made is a common one or it isn't a mistake, they are just taking a flyer.

This wasn't one of Mr Mustard's cases so he doesn't have any photos for you but we can surmise that a car was parked in the middle of the carriageway fairly close to the brick wall which terminates the carriageway. Mr Mustard expects the car was within the white rectangle.

The neighbours probably have an arrangement to block each other in and move when required. An arrangement with a traffic warden is a dangerous one as they come and go and their boss might intervene.

If you are so parked both sides of your car are more than 50cm from the edge of the carriageway and if the car was reversed in then the front of the car is also more than 50cm from the edge of the carriageway. However, providing the car is backed up to within 50cm of the wall, as it must have been in this case, it is not in contravention.

Not only should the traffic warden not have issued the PCN, the council should not have rejected the representations and nor should they have resisted the Appeal but £130 was at stake and that causes errors of judgments within councils, not just Hounslow..

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.

Newham Council are Cheats - #43

 

The above tribunal decision is one of the most coruscating criticisms that Mr Mustard has ever seen. Mr Mustard doesn't comment much on adjudicators but Mr Walsh was premier league (Mr Mustard won 2 cases and lost 1 before him and wishes he was still there) and has deservedly been elevated to the position of District Judge in Willesden Magistrates Court.

What this case amply demonstrates is the wilful blindness which Mr Mustard has long suspected exists PCN enforcement offices (council and contractors) and the reject everything philosophy which he thinks exists.

Many of the public still naively believe that a council will be fair but it isn't necessarily so, the urgent need to revenue raise has elbowed public service and fairness out of the way in many councils.

It was no surprise that an order for costs was sought and granted even though they rarely are.

Just before that long read here is the sign that was there and the sign the council blindly assumed was there:

 

Make yourself a cup of tea and settle into a comfy chair.

 

Newham Council tried to get out cheap at £50 which considering they tried to extract an unlawful £130 was pretty mean of them. 

The council are described in this decision as dishonest & deceptive a characterisation which Mr Mustard agrees with and which is often the case.

Now a general warning for all taxi drivers, black can and private hire alike, this rather odd restriction applies overnight from 10pm to 3am so after collecting someone from the City Airport the driver needs to choose a route which avoids this particular dual carriageway.

 

and this is how it looks on the ground, being unable to exit a roundabout is unusual, a red no entry sign would be clearer

Remember: not all councils can be trusted to be unbiased in their consideration of your arguments. Adjudicators can be trusted as they don't receive the penalty if they do find against you.

The end, thank you for your patience.