§ 2.50 p.m.
§ LORD NUGENT OF GUILDFORDMy Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
§ [The Question was as follows:
§ To ask Her Majesty's Government whether they will state the parking-meter statistics for the past three years for the issue of excess charge tickets and fixed penalty tickets, and the number of excess charges and fixed penalties which failed to be collected in each of these three years.]
§ LORD BESWICKMy Lords, during 1966, 1967 and 1968, respectively, the police in England and Wales issued 502,551, 776,274 and 1,046,256 fixed penalty notices in all. Payment was waived, or not made, in 144,023, 236,628 and 360.694 of these cases, respectively. It would require a disproportionate effort to discover in how many cases the offence alleged in the notices was committed at a parking bay, or to discover the num-bers of excess charge notices issued by or on behalf of local authorities.
§ LORD NUGENT OF GUILDFORDMy Lords, I thank the noble Lord for that very informative Answer. Is he aware that it indicates a serious deterioration, in that the number of failures to collect the fixed penalty has doubled in three years? Is the noble Lord aware that the prospect of getting away with a parking offence by simply ignoring the notice is improving very much indeed? I do not wish to give noble Lords a hint in this matter, but is the noble Lord aware that, in the interests of traffic flow, it is vital to keep the traffic routes clear? Will he say what action the Government are going to take in the matter?
§ LORD BESWICKMy Lords, the noble Lord is undoubtedly on to a very serious problem here, and I am glad to see that he draws a correct conclusion; namely, that one has to enforce the system rather than, as some people would have us do, diminish the number of park-ing restrictions. As to the remedies that are being taken, the Ministry of Transport have recently commissioned a firm of management consultants to go into this question, to analyse the problem and to make recommendations. It is hoped that their analysis will be ready in the next few weeks. On the general issue, I think it would be a mistake—and I am sure the noble Lord will agree with me—to encourage people, whether noble Lords 447 in this House or people outside, to think that they can get away with this offence.
§ LORD NUGENT OF GUILDFORDMy Lords, I thank the noble Lord for that further reply. May I ask him whether he is aware that I entirely agree with him that both public transport and private vehicles depend for their traffic movement on complete discipline in park-ing control, and that the parking meter attendants, far from being our enemies, are our friends?
§ LORD BESWICKMy Lords, I quite agree, and I am glad that the noble Lord should have emphasised that point. May I also say that a number of proposals were put before the Select Committee of the House of Commons—I think it was last year—one of which was that the fine should be applied to the owner of the vehicle rather than to the driver. This is something which the Select Committee themselves turned down quite definitely but which my right honourable friend is still studying.
§ LORD LEATHERLANDMy Lords, does not my noble friend think that one way out of this difficulty, inasmuch as the number of the car is known, is that when the owner applies for his next excise licence he should be told that he cannot have one until he has paid the fine?
§ LORD BESWICKMy Lords, as I tried to make clear, the offence is not necessarily committed by the owner of the vehicle. At the moment it is the driver of the vehicle who is involved, and the possibility of applying the penalty to the owner rather than to the driver is one solution that has been offered.