West Sussex County Council: Traffic Management Act 2004 (Part 6)

Links to Sections

• Changes to the way parking is enforced
• New tariffs for penalty charges - uunder the Traffic Management Act 2004
• What happened when the TMA came into force on 31 March 2008
• Higher band penalty charge contraventions
• Lower band penalty charge contraventions
• Tips on how to avoid getting a penalty charge notice

Major changes in the way in which local authorities enforce parking changed recently as long awaited Government regulations came into affect on 31 March 2008.

Under the new regulations this activity became known as Civil Parking Enforcement (CPE) and parking attendants became known as Civil Enforcement Officers (CEOs).

The new regulations, which form Part 6 of the Traffic Management Act 2004, are designed to make parking enforcement more motorist friendly and represent the most radical shake up of parking enforcement in England and Wales for many years. The new framework makes it clear that local authorities should not use parking enforcement as a tool for raising revenue, and should not set targets for the number of Penalty Charge Notices issued. Local authorities are also encouraged to allow officers to use more discretion over when a Penalty Charge Notice is issued.

Local authorities are now able to issue lower penalties for less serious parking contraventions and have to include details of procedures for appeals on Penalty Charge Notices. Independent parking adjudicators also get more power, including the right to ask local authorities to reconsider penalty charges where motorists have mitigating circumstances.

The regulations introduced new parking contraventions that allow local authorities to issue Penalty Charge Notices to motorists that are double parked or parked across a dropped footway e.g. pedestrian crossing. In certain exceptional circumstances (where a Civil Enforcement Officer is threatened or subjected to violence or the vehicle is driven away) there is no longer be a need for a Penalty Charge Notice to be placed on a vehicle or handed to the driver in order for it to be properly served, as the new regulations allow the Penalty Charge Notice to be posted to the registered keeper of the vehicle.

For the time being, we will not be applying the new powers to enforce double parking or parking across a dropped footway. Nor will it be using CCTV to enforce illegal parking or issue Penalty Charge Notices by post.  Local authorities across West Sussex already work in partnership with each other, to provide consistency and will adopt the same penalty charges across the county.

The Government Minister for Transport Rosie Winterton has recently said of Civil Parking Enforcement:

"The Government has been quite clear that parking enforcement must be fair, clear, consistent and based on robust evidence - we want to increase public confidence in parking.

Parking rules exist to help beat congestion and improve road safety. With more than 30 million vehicles on Britain's roads, just one vehicle parked in the wrong place can, and frequently does, cause traffic jams. It can also put other road users in danger.

However, there is a perception that motorists are sometimes unfairly penalised. To overcome this, from 31 March, we are introducing new powers to make parking enforcement fairer and easier to challenge."