Tribunal Appeals - school report 2016 - Barnet Council

The chart above shows the fluctuations in the number of Appeals being decided each month. Generally the Appeal is heard one month after it is lodged. Looking at the last 4 months alone is interesting. Since moving traffic contraventions started in earnest in the summer the number of Appeals has surged forward (January 17 sees a slight drop but probably as the tribunal was closed for 10 days for Xmas & New Year holidays).

Overall PCN issue figures are in the chart below, with comparatives for 2015.

Type	2015	2016
Bus lane	11,601	6,642
Moving traffic	-	39,150
Parking	141,114	149,168
Totals	154,730	196,976

It is very pleasing to see bus lane figures coming down despite the introduction of automatic cameras which miss almost nothing. Motorists have perhaps finally realised that they will be caught so had best stay out of the bus lane. Some people never enter a bus lane as a matter of policy and that may not be a bad policy. If the bus lane is not in operation there probably won't be a queue in the all traffic lane in any event so there is nothing to gain by using the bus lane.

 

Moving traffic (yellow box junctions, banned turns, school zig-zags etc) are the new real money spinner for Barnet Council. The figures are for less than a full year.

It will take a while for the penny to drop that a banned turn, like at Tilling Rd near Brent Cross, which you have been wrongly doing for 20 years, will now cost you £130 a time. Once people realise the numbers will fall a little. New cameras are springing up at every possible location though, as this cash cow is one to be milked, so the numbers may rise before they fall.

 

The biggest problem (success in the eyes of the council) is with yellow box junctions.

 

There needs to be a wholesale change with the way that people drive, so as to avoid PCN, and it will lead to slower journey times across the borough if everyone takes the cautious and correct approach of waiting until the box is clear before they enter it. How to do it is explained on the TfL page here. Note the sparse London traffic a la 1950.

 

School zig zag PCN's are remarkably low. 

 

 

 

24 locations are monitored, so ignoring August (one unlucky person when the school was closed and so Barnet choose not to enforce as no harm is being done) and April as that was when the scheme was just warming up, we have 7 month's data and this equates to a single contravention every 2 days per school. This is hardly a rate of contravention that calls for a six figure sum to be spent on cameras. Those stories of carmaggedon at school drop off and pick up time look likely to have been false news.

 

Remember that a PCN is not a personal attack on you, it is simply an attempt to open your wallet or purse. Officially these are all issued for traffic management purposes. Poppycock.

Appeal results

I nearly forgot.

Of the 2,202 Appeal heard in the year, the motorist won 1,193 of them which is 54% of them against a norm of 48% across London.

966 went the way of the council and 41 were the subject of a request by the adjudicator to just drop it even though the council was legally correct but there was compelling mitigation which an adjudicator cannot allow an Appeal on the basis of, only the council can.

Yours appealingly

Miss Feezance

PATAS - w/c 6 May 14 - Cloned

It was a quiet week at PATAS as far as Barnet Council were concerned. 841 new Appeals were filed of which 43 emanated from Barnet, that is 5% which is slightly above what one would expect. Ignoring 19 Witness Statement (TE9) cases that were never going anywhere there were 79 substantive cases. Of those some 54 led to a cancelled PCN. That is a terrific 68% win rate for the motorist.

There were a number of notable wins for motorists:

• In two cases of postal PCN the traffic warden was held not to have been prevented from serving, in one case the traffic warden wasn't even at the scene.
• In a bus lane case there wasn't any cctv footage, that seems to happen quite often.
• Someone accused of parking without payment produced the little ticket you get out of the credit card machine, which had been upside down on their dashboard, and so were not held to have not paid. They should probably have been given a parking ticket for a different contravention or the council should have cancelled the PCN once the proof of payment was provided.
• A yellow line in Lodge Road was found to be inadequate to properly convey the restriction.
• In a very odd case Barnet Council tried to file a Do Not Contest form 2 days after the expected hearing date. The adjudicator refused the request. They also tried to obtain a 14 day adjournment 2 days after the expected hearing date, this was also refused. The adjudicator then heard the case and found for the motorist on the grounds of lack of evidence from the council. The adjudicator wasn't taking any nonsense that day.
• A motorist who lived in Portsmouth, and had a car which did not look like the one in the council's photos, was found to have had her numberplate cloned.
• Someone who was boarding a disabled passenger was allowed the requisite time to do so.
• Two ancient PCN from July 12 and November 12 were duly killed off.

Keep those appeals flowing and make NSL and the council fight to get your money out of your purse or wallet.

Yours appealingly

Miss Feezance

PATAS - w/c 22 July 2013

A bus lane but no bus

Another fairly typical week at PATAS led to 39 parking tickets being cancelled ("canx") and 36 being upheld.

 

In a bus lane case from 2012 there wasn't any cctv evidence. I wonder if it has all been stored properly or if room was needed on the hard disks for more recent footage? The problem in this case was also that a Charge Certificate was issued a month after the appeal was scheduled at PATAS and nothing further should have been done for the council. This alone was enough to cancel the PCN.

 

A bay wasn't reinstated after roadworks and so without lines PCNs should not have been issued at that location. PCN canx.

 

A PCN was issued to someone which related to the period before they owned the car. Why that wasn't sorted out without a PATAS hearing is a mystery. PCN canx.

 

In another location the Traffic Management Order that was produced and the local sign were for different times so the PCN was canx.

 

Someone had a sprained ankle and this was found to be compelling mitigation for the cancellation of their PCN. The adjudicator has a heart even if Barnet Council and NSL don't.

 

Near to Tally Ho there is a closed pub which is now a closed restaurant called Googoosh. It looks private with 3 spaces marked out for parking. The council issue parking tickets there but as this motorist had parked there for years without receiving a PCN he had a reasonable expectation he would not be ticketed and so his PCN was canx.

 

In a technical case a motorist parked on the pavement but partly outside of the lines. They were given a PCN for parking outside a parking bay but it isn't a parking bay in this situation so they should have been ticketed for pavement parking. Result, the PCN was canx.

 

The council failed to prove the signage for a 3 hour restriction and so that PCN was canx.

 

The description of some suspended bays was misleading and so the PCN was canx.

 

The adjudicator is getting rather bored with pointing out to the council that the signs in Nursery Walk and the Traffic Management Order do not agree with each other and he keeps cancelling PCN. He has suggested they fix the problem.

 

A case in which the council didn't deal with formal representations at all (they have to respond within 56 days) led to the PCN being canx.

 

I am not sure that enough appeals are being done. Could you appeal every ticket you get please. remember you can appeal 3 times, once informally in response to the PCN, once again on the same grounds when you get the Notice to owner and finally to PATAS when the council send you a Notice of Rejection of Representations. No doesn't always mean no when the council reject your appeal; the adjudicator might say it means yes. There is only one way to find out; appeal!

 

Yours appealingly

 

Miss Feezance