§ Mr. Peter BottomleyTo ask the Secretary of State for Transport when the gross costs and charges of parking meter enforcement ceased to be part of the public accounts. [4357]
§ Mr. BowisDrivers who exceed the permitted time at a parking meter may incur an initial excess charge, subsequently followed by a penalty charge. Excess charges have always accrued to the local authority, which must maintain a separate account of income and expenditure arising from on-street parking places. Penalty charges are generally enforced by the serving by traffic wardens of a fixed penalty notice imposing a fine payable into court.
Where local authorities have assumed responsibility for on-street parking enforcement under the Road Traffic Act 1991, penalty charge notices are, however, issued by local authority-employed parking attendants and the income is retained by the authority. All London boroughs had taken 480W on this responsibility by July 1994, but outside London only Hampshire county council, in respect of the city of Winchester, has yet done so.