" Foreign car owners cost £86,000 in unpaid fines "
A LOOPHOLE over foreign registered vehicles
has left the city council tens of thousands of pounds out of pocket.
Almost 1,500 parking tickets issued to drivers
in foreign vehicles since 2003 are still unpaid, with countless written off
because the authorities cannot track down those responsible.
In fact, just 312 tickets issued in the city
to foreign vehicles have been paid – out of 1,886.
At £60 a Penalty Charge Notice (PCN), the
council has lost out on £86,160.
Today, The Evening Telegraph can reveal that
while about 17 per cent of tickets issued to non-UK registered vehicles have
been paid, 63 per cent of those issued to UK registered vehicles have been paid
for the same period.
Parking services manager at Peterborough City
Council Rob Saunders said: "These figures reflect the frustration we feel about
this issue, which is by no means unique to Peterborough.
"The DVLA keeps information on UK registered
vehicles and requires non-UK registered vehicles to be registered within six
months of arrival."
"However, this is not happening with all
vehicles, which results in it being impossible to trace the driver.
"The lack of a European wide DVLA style
registration system is something the British Government is pushing for, but
until that is in place, councils, police and other such organisations will
suffer similar problems."
That frustration was echoed by the police
after countless speeding fines have gone unpaid because of troubles tracking
down those responsible.
A police spokeswoman said: "It is always more
difficult to trace vehicles registered abroad than it is British registered
vehicles, but we will always work hard with other agencies on this matter.
"Although it is harder to trace foreign
registered vehicles in relation to speeding offences detected by static cameras,
we do have tactics in place to enable us to trace the registered keeper, such as
the use of our Automatic Number Plate Recognition technology."
Peterborough MP Stewart Jackson said: "I think
that it's a very serious concern because it discriminates against local
people who, when they park incorrectly, are
forced to pay a parking fine, whereas people who aren't from Peterborough get
away scot-free.
"I will be writing to the Department of
Transport asking how it plans to rectify this unfairness
and make sure that everybody is treated the
same."
It is a problem across the country and has led
to a project called Sparks being launched to lobby the European Union to create
a Europe-wide database.
Programme manager Bill Blakemore said: "At the
moment this is a major problem.
"It's very difficult to get the information
about who owns the foreign registered vehicle.
"Even if you can trace the owner, there is no
legal framework to force people to pay if they choose to ignore it."
Research commissioned by the project revealed
that three million foreign registered vehicles enter the UK each year.
FACTFILE:
All Penalty Charge Notices issued to non-UK
registered vehicles between September 22, 2003 and January 22, 2008: 1,886.
Paid cases for this period: 312.
Cases written off: 1,436.
Live cases: 138.
Source: [ peterboroughtoday ]
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