£120 fine for 80 second phone call at roadside

A driver who pulled over to take a mobile phone call from his mother has been forced to pay a high price for the conversation - about £1.40 a second.

Nick Tubbs was dashing to a meeting in Westminster when his phone rang. His hands-free earpiece was not connected so he took the safe course of action and stopped briefly at the side of the road in Bruton Street in his LPG-powered Mini.

The call lasted one minute and 23 seconds. But a week later the property developer from Shepherd's Bush received a £120 fine for "parking" on a single yellow line.

He paid the penalty at the 50 per cent discounted rate of £60 to avoid the fine rising to the full amount but protested his innocence and demanded to be let off.

However, Westminster cashed his cheque and refused to back down.

In a letter to Mr Tubbs, the council said: "You stated that the vehicle was not 'parked' as you were in the vehicle with the engine running. The word parking is defined as follows: 'To park, to stop or leave a vehicle in a specific location.'

"This means that you do not have to leave the vehicle in order for it to be parked. Stopping to answer a mobile phone is not permitted on yellow lines.

"Your vehicle was recorded for one minute and 23 seconds. This is considered to be long enough time in which we should see some activity that indicates why the vehicle was parked." Mr Tubbs, 45, said: "This fine is utterly ridiculous and means that almost any driver in London who dares to pause at the side of the road for a few seconds to check a map or take a call is at risk. What are you meant to do if your phone rings? It is absurd for Westminster to claim it was parking. I was in the car and the engine was running."

Parking campaigner Barrie Segal of Appealnow.com said: "This is an absurd method of enforcement and one that encourages people to think this is not about keeping traffic moving but revenue.

"Westminster may technically be correct but it means that anyone stopping for even a second or two to blow their nose or with hayfever now risks a fine. If a parking attendant had seen him, instead of a CCTV camera operator, he may well have simply been asked to move along."

A Westminster spokesman said: "Drivers are not allowed to wait at this location during controlled hours unless they are loading and unloading, which this motorist was clearly not doing.

"As a result, he was issued a ticket by one of our CCTV cameras, which he subsequently paid. The camera images also showed that the motorist was waiting near a busy junction, causing a blockage, and forced other motorists and a cyclist to veer around him."