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Drivers fined £300m a year

David Williams Motoring Editor|Evening Standard
13 April 2012

The full extent of parking fines and fees paid by motorists in London is revealed today.

New figures show councils rake in almost £300 million a year - way above previous estimates.

Westminster council alone took more than £64million in fines, clamping and towing fees and parking meter cash, the figures show.

Second on the "rich list" is Kensington and Chelsea which took nearly £31million, followed by Camden which took £29,259 in 2003, the latest year for which figures are available.

Alongside the huge parking incomes collected by the boroughs, there has also been a significant increase in violent attacks on parking attendants.

According to the Association of London Government (ALG), more than three wardens are attacked in the capital each day. Wardens have been set upon by groups of attackers wielding baseball bats, run over by motorists and even shot at.

Both sets of data will form part of the evidence the ALG - which represents the boroughs - will deliver to a London Assembly investigation into parking enforcement in the capital next week. The 25-page dossier reveals that:

  • An estimated 50 million parking offences are committed in London each year, of which only about 10 per cent are detected - although in areas where CCTV is used, detection rates have leapt to 80 per cent.
  • About 15 to 20 per cent of fines issued to motorists are not paid.
  • Motorists challenge two in 10 parking tickets, but only one per cent of all those that are issued get as far as the independent Parking and Traffic Appeals Service. Six in 10 appeals that go before adjudicators are won by motorists.
  • Of the 29 councils for which figures are available, only two made a loss on parking operations. Nine had surpluses of less than £1 million while 24 had surpluses of up to ?4 million.
  • Out of the boroughs' total £296.5million income from parking, they paid ?184million to run their parking schemes - leaving a surplus of £112.5million. That surplus, says the report, is spent on schemes including funding "freedom pass" travel concessions for the elderly and disabled, cycle lanes and projects such as the new Hungerford Bridge and the revamp of Kensington High Street.

The rise in attacks on wardens is condemned by the report. "Parking attendants work in difficult circumstances, frequently on their own," it reads. "While the outcome of their work is beneficial to London, those receiving penalties are rarely appreciative of this and many are abusive.

"On average more than three attendants are assaulted every day in London - a shocking statistic."

Meanwhile, speed cameras are generating more than ?20 million a year in profit, it emerged today. The number of speeding tickets issued in England and Wales has soared sevenfold from 260,000 in 2000-2001 to 1.8 million in 2003-2004.

The Treasury has defended the increase in profit, claiming it would be used for public services. The figures come from a written parliamentary question to David Jamieson, the road safety minister.

Alistair Darling the Transport Secretary defended the use of speed cameras. He said the vast majority of cameras had brought "real benefits in safety and prove they are justified".

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