Had a ticket in Ealing ... better read this and tell your friends

Ealing's Councillor Taylor says: "We have to draw the line somewhere ..." May I humbly suggest that he gets permission AND legal advice first. Ealing Council is already in enough trouble drawing lines where they shouldn't!

Ealing Council could be investigated by police for fraud
10:38am Thursday 11th December 2008
Ealing Times
By Alex Hayes

POLICE could be called in to investigate Ealing Council for fraud after it refused to hand out refunds for cash taken on unlawful box junctions.

Cops are investigating a north London borough where 73 tickets were handed out by the local council on one unlawfully marked box junction.

This number is dwarfed by the 59,728 penalties handed out by Ealing Council in the past two years on six junctions which were finally taken up earlier this month, following advice from the Department of Transport (DfT).

Ealing Council has agreed to repay people sent £100 tickets from the junctions in Southall, Hanwell and Ealing Broadway, from June 20, when it was revealed last week the council was told the markings were wrong by the DfT.

However, campaigners are now pushing councillors to refund every penny dished out by drivers since the junctions were put in place in 2004.

Jim Douglas, a campaigner for the Motorists Legal Challenge, an organisation set up to challenge councils over incorrect road markings, said the group was considering calling in police to investigate Ealing Council on grounds of fraud.

He said: "The principles of British law have shown the money is refundable from when it started to be taken unlawfully, and not from when the council was told it was wrong.
"This has been proven in court with banks found guilty of mis-selling policies. They offered to pay back cash from when they discovered products were being mis-sold, but were told to pay back the whole lot.
"We still want the council to admit its mistake and pay back the cash, but until it does this it will have dirty money on its books."

Mr Douglas also said police investigating the other box junction had admitted it was a sensitive area, because of their close working relationship with the local authority.
Ealing Council has spent thousands of pounds putting 50 extra Police Community Support Officers (PCSOs) on the streets, and also works closely with officers in areas such as trading standards and envirocrime.

He continued: "Obviously, this problem could present itself in Ealing as well, and so we want to know whether officers from Ealing would be investigating.
"There is a conflict of interests here, so perhaps it would be better if it was looked at by people from another borough who are independent."

He said the group would be contacting Councillor Phil Taylor, who is in charge of parking, to lay down its position before pursuing the case any further.
Cllr Taylor said the threat would not change the council's stance on the issue.
He told the Ealing Times: "We have to draw the line somewhere, and if we kept going back over history the council would never be able to move forward in anything it does.
"We still believe those junctions were legal, but the DfT weren't happy with them so we took them up."
Anyone interested in joining the campaign for a refund can send an email to: ealing@motoristslegalchallenge.co.uk

What do you think of Ealing Council's position? You can post a comment below or contact Councillor Taylor on his blog here

EXPOSED ... Ealing Council knew its junctions were illegal and still banked £1m

How many times did the cock crow?

How many denials have been issued?

More than 30 pieces of silver involved here ...

This will serve as a message to all councils, council officials and councillors out there.

This is not a game. Parking and moving traffic enforcement is not a revenue raiser and you cannot 'disregard' the law when it doesn't suit or when it impacts on the council's cashflow and budget. You cannot take money from the public to which you are not entitled.

It is one thing to be incompetent and get the law wrong. It is a very, very different situation to continue to take money in the full knowledge that such actions are unlawful.

The piece below is the result of the fantastic and determined work by Parking Appeals' Yellow Box expert Jim Douglas.

Taylor apologises over Southall box junction enforcement scandal
26th November 2008
By Alex Hayes

A COUNCILLOR has apologised after it was revealed officials knew six box junctions were unlawful five months before they were removed.

Councillor Phil Taylor gave the “unreserved apology” after it was revealed a council official was told by email in June by the Department for Transport (DfT) the six box junctions were too big.
However, thousands of tickets were handed to drivers until the DfT spoke to the council again at the beginning of November, and enforcement stopped.

The amount taken in fines on four of the boxes in South Road and High Street, Southall over that time could amount to nearly £1m.

Councillor Bassam Mahfouz, the Labour transport spokesman, said: “There is damning evidence to show the council has failed to act after it knew the truth.

“In June they said they did not need permission from the DfT for these junctions, but then went and asked anyway.
“They were trying to deflect blame from themselves and push it onto the DfT. I gave Cllr Taylor the chance in private and in a Full Council meeting to suspend these junctions until the DfT ruling was in, but he declined both times.
“Now it turns out someone at the council knew the entire time. Cllr Taylor has accused me of being inflammatory, but the really inflammatory thing her is people were forced to pay when the council knew they were not legal.”

The row over the junctions blew up after a series of victories for drivers at appeal hearings at the parking adjudicator which started at the end of 2007.

However, at an appeal hearing on October 29, where a bus company was handed £700 in costs, a lawyer from the council was still claiming they had not heard back from the DfT.

Cllr Taylor, who is in charge of parking services, said he had not been shown the June email until today (yesterday).
He said: “We will be refunding everyone ticketed at the affected yellow box junctions since June 20.
“At the beginning of November we immediately suspended the junctions following advice from the Department for Transport.
“I believed that this was the first time the Council had been given this advice or the decision to stop enforcing them would have taken in June.
“I am furious that this email was never brought to my attention and I have ordered an immediate investigation on how this could have happened.”

Parking campaigner Neil Herron called for resignations, and for every penny taken from drivers since the bays started to be enforced to be paid back.

He said: “If this had happened at any private institution heads would roll.
“I think there should be resignations on the table after this.
“The question now should not be who do we repay, but how fast can we repay everyone who has ever been caught on these junctions.
“These people are public servants yet their attitude has been to deny everything and refuse to listen to advice.
“It's not what the public expects.”

Over the last two years more than £3m has been taken from drivers on the six wrongly-marked junctions, with £1.2m being taken since April this year.