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Parking Policy

It is a great pleasure to speak in the debate. I begin by congratulating my neighbour the hon. Member for Crewe and Nantwich (Mrs. Dunwoody) on chairing the Committee in such a robust manner and on coming up with an interesting report that has flushed out an issue of enormous concern. This area is probably the one in which the state impacts on the citizen in the most aggressive manner—in some cases anyway. There are probably more citizens upset by this issue than by many other aspects of state activity. We have had an interesting debate in which my hon. Friends the Members for Basingstoke (Mrs. Miller) and for Kettering (Mr. Hollobone) raised the real problem, which the Government must face, that their ambitious building programme runs parallel to an enormous increase in car ownership. Spectacular numbers in that regard apply in Basingstoke. The hon. Member for Manchester, Blackley (Graham Stringer) made an interesting speech in which he raised the issue of liveability—a terrible word—and the more interesting question of localism and whether this issue is the domain of central or local government. The one clear lesson of the Committee’s report is the spectacular difference in some 2003 figures. Some 7,123,000 penalty charge notices were issued in the 75 local authorities and the 33 London boroughs where decriminalised parking enforcement powers operated, whereas 1,043,000 were issued in the 313 authorities where the police have adjudication. Large sums of money are involved, as was mentioned by the hon. Member for Manchester, Blackley. We are talking about £1 billion, some 60 per cent. of which comes from charges and 40 per cent. of which comes from penalty notices. I agree that there should be a uniform regime, which should come under local government, as the hon. Member for Crewe and Nantwich suggests. The main purpose of this colossal exercise is traffic management, road safety and managing the impact on business. I stress that there is widespread unease and anger among some of the general public, and it has not been mentioned in this debate. Handing this exercise over to local government—where it can be the policeman, prosecutor, judge, jury and benefactor—leaves the system open to abuse. It could be a system like tax farming in Bourbon France. I agree with the hon. Lady’s report that transparency is necessary and important. I shall come to that in a moment. The public must see that, for their charges and penalties, they get a service and they buy a benefit. That point was strongly made in the contribution by my hon. Friend the Member for Kettering. It is extraordinary that when a local authority puts in and signs off a declaration that something conforms to central Government demands on a parking scheme, it has to conform only to the technical details—the marking, signing and various other issues. There is no requirement for the impact on traffic, road safety or business to be part of an application. There is no audit of such things, and that is a fundamental flaw of the system. If the public saw a direct link between what they were being charged and fined for parking and the benefits, we could get round much of this public acceptance problem. The Department for Transport is surely the agency to address this. There has been talk about having a regulator, but I agree with the Government and with the Committee that that is not the right approach. This should just be a routine issue for the DFT when it receives an application for a parking scheme from a local government agency. I do not think this is treading on the toes of local government. To deal with the comments made by the hon. Member for Manchester, Blackley, I should say that local government is in constant communication with the DFT on road schemes and trunk roads that may have been de-trunked. A routine aspect of an application for a parking scheme should be that standards should be set for traffic flow, and for the impact on road safety and on business. This has not really been touched on. The Government response talked about a ““communications toolkit”” and, rather piously, about hoping that the local authority could"““use parking policy, controls, pricing and enforcement primarily to keep the traffic flowing and improve road safety.””" This aim should be made much clearer and it should be mandatory. There should be a clear mechanism involving Government, and an audit. The Committee said:"““Compliance with parking regulations is the most important measure of performance within a parking enforcement regime.””" That is true up to a point, because the Committee should have gone a step further and considered traffic impact. The hon. Member for Southport (Dr. Pugh) mentioned the most dramatic paragraph—paragraph 43—in the Committee report; we learned the astonishing fact that the Committee."““could not find a single annual report published by a council parking department.””" I shall not read the details out again, because he has been through them and we have heard a list of things that should be in such a report, including the revenue collected and the number of penalty charges. Such a document should clearly be available to the general public. It is not good enough for the Government’s reply to say that"““it is relatively easy for members of the public to find out what is happening in their area.””" It jolly well is not easy. I challenge anyone who thinks it is to go through the list that the Committee came up with. There should also be an annual audit of the impact on vehicles, business, traffic speeds and road safety. If that were done, this exercise would be so much more valuable and acceptable to the general public, who have a strong suspicion that they are being milked. If there is only decriminalisation and no means of auditing and no central control, they may be subject to abuse. The hon. Member for Crewe and Nantwich asked the Minister a list of questions, some of which were foxes which, had I asked them, would have been shot. I shall pick up a few points because I want to give the Minister plenty of time to reply. I was interested in the element on training and staff. What discussions has she had on that? The Government reply mentioned the British Parking Association’s sector skills strategy, which I believe has suggested that level 2 City and Guilds should be a standard across the country. Will she give us an idea about how far the Government are going on that? The reply states that the Government hope that such an approach would"““go a long way to achieving a substantial and sustained improvement over the years””." Is that a realistic proposition and how long might it take to enforce? I entirely agree with the comments that the hon. Member for Crewe and Nantwich has made about foreign-registered vehicles. The situation in that regard causes a grievance for many members of the public. I turn to the question of loading. Drivers who deliver for supermarkets and other retailers have told me that there is a grievance about the problems of legitimately delivering goods. The Government’s reply was weak on this issue and on delivery times. What is their thinking on curfews and on being more flexible? The situation is ridiculous. I walk past an articulated Mercedes-Benz truck delivering to Tesco outside the Home Office at 9 am every morning. Is it sensible that a truck of that size comes into Westminster at that hour, an area being used mainly by people going to offices or, possibly, by MPs preparing for this debate? The big question that requires joined-up government is planning, which was mentioned by my hon. Friends the Members for Basingstoke and for Kettering. It is extraordinary that the planning policy guidance intends to reduce parking spaces. The Government must face up to the consequences of this enormous planned increase in house building at the same time as increased prosperity. As the hon. Member for Crewe and Nantwich said in her opening comments, the first thing that people want to do with their wealth is to get independence and to buy a car. There has been a sharp increase in the levels of car ownership. As we heard in some of the constituency cases that were mentioned, all this is coming together in a horrendous manner. On the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency, the question of the sale of information to outside organisations has been raised with me on several occasions. I have had discussions with the British Parking Association. There was a plan to have a registered trade association, so that accredited members only could have access to information from the DVLA and purchase it. This is a fraught area, because there are concerns about cowboy operators getting and possibly misusing information. The Government promised:"““A full update on progress in delivering these new measures will be available in the autumn.””" Where exactly have they got to on that? There is increasingly widespread public concern on the matter. Will the Minister comment on the accuracy of the DVLA? That is again an issue that has been raised with me on several occasions. We are told that 97 per cent. accuracy has been reached. Given that 32 million vehicles are involved, a substantial number, 320,000 by my calculations, are unaccounted for. As the hon. Member for Manchester, Blackley said, the figure of 2 million uninsured cars is floating around, and I am sure it is right. Such cars probably cause a disproportionate problem. We raised the matter frequently in the amendments that we proposed to the Road Safety Bill in the previous Parliament. Will the Minister give us the latest estimate on the DVLA’s traceability figure? How many cars does she think respectively are unlicensed, uninsured and untraceable? I look forward to hearing her replies to my questions. I once again congratulate the hon. Member for Crewe and Nantwich on her Committee’s report. It would be that much improved if the link were made between parking schemes and their impact on traffic, road safety and business.