I’m going to wade in here! I watched that and I’m utterly disgusted about what happened and the fact he felt he needed to take his own life.
But let us be very clear here, the council and the fine was not the cause. It was how the debt collectors handled this!
For a start, they could not take his bike as it was financed to his step dad, meaning he was not the legal owner and therefore it was unenforceable, did he know that no he did not, did they check it no!
Did they offer him reasonable payment terms, no they did not, did they go through his inc/exp no they did not!
I feel very passionate about this as I was once a debt collector and it made me sick to the stomach how he was treated.
Should things be clearer yes they should, but the fine/council were not what ended this guys life it was the shear lack of any morale standing by the company employed to recover the debt!
My rant is over.
If anyone is ever in that situation, please talk to the companies trying to recover. They are not animals and will work with you if you’re willing to work with them…
No, there was no one single cause, but the fine was a contributor to his situation, as was a poorly regulated debt collector, and the lad’s own mental health. And all of those things were made worse by poverty. But let’s not lose sight of the fact that parking fines for motorcycles are for made-up offences, because there is no actual offense in the real world. Motorcycles have no measurable impact on pollution, no measurable impact on the availability of parking for other vehicles, and if there’s any anti-social behaviour, that is what should be addressed, not the bikes. I don’t see the council seeking to control similar antisocial behaviour by discouraging the use of bicycles, for instance.
London Borough of Waltham Forest are using fines to discourage motorcycling in the borough. They actually wrote that in their report. I can understand why someone might not be all that bothered about that, or other people’s hardship, but I don’t understand why anyone would actively defend the council on it, especially a motorcyclist.
It is maddening. At least for car drivers they actually put up signage explaining things, and if the signs are not clear you have the basis of an appeal but somehow motorcyclists - who can be hit with the same penalties - are expected to know that parking in residents bays is permitted on one side of a borough boundary and not on the other. No signage explains this, you are expected to know.
I have noticed that a number of delivery scooters / mopeds now park in pay and display bays near fast food outlets. Often they take up the whole bay so no other vehicles can pay to park there. Lost revenue to local council hence they feel the need to charge bikes.
I live in Waltham forest and it’s a total joke, that unlike sensible bouroughs like Haringey, Hackney , Brent and others that allow bikes to park in resident bays and shared use bays etc. The actual rules vary from bourough to bourough but at least they seem to agree with most sensible people that bikes can be accommodated within existing infrastructure and at no cost to the eco friendly lower than car emissions style of transport we prefer on here. Less emmisions ,less congestion covid friendly style of save the planet transport. Why do Waltham Forest see this totally differently than most .Its got to be the money /revenue for themselves as they don’t seem to have a clue on green transport issues.Why not fo what they do in Islington and charge more to park your diesel 4x4 .Can anyone outline the actual law around using bike covers ,as I know in certain parts of London if you have a cover on it wardens are allegedly not allowed to take it off or lift it up to see your number plate, in order to give you a ticket . If this is true then we may need to tell the world and unscrupulous councils get there just deserts,ie no income from bikes.Can anyone post an updated parking in London flyer like the one I think Motoden used to run as London members need to know this stuff
If it is the case ,I think car covers will be next lol.
Happy Riding guys.
Most covers sold cannot be used legally on a public road (though you would be very unlucky for the police to fine for it) and a warden can remove them.
As with much of common law there is no statute which either expressly permits or prohibits a council employed warden from removing a cover. Nor has any legal precedent been set, though as if everyone were to cover their plates it would make enforcement impossible, so I would be surprised if a court would rule against a warden checking.
And once the cover has been removed and they can see the licence plate, they are free to issue tickets for other offences such a parking ones.
So even if someone wanted to challenge the cover being removed in court, they would have to admit to illegally obscuring the plate, the council will say they were legally obliged to check the plate, and the end result will be having to pay two fines instead of one.
Of course you are free to try using a cover and hope a warden will not not know the law or cannot be bother to check. Something which probably varies between different authorities.
Be careful here! I once had to park on the pavement, covered my bike. Came back an hour later to a parking ticket and a fine from the police who were called to remove said cover.
So i ended up forking out about £120 for 1hrs parking. Needless to say I have not attempted that again.
But only if there is a legal reason for identifying the vehicle underneath.
Which is why in The_Sleeper’s situation the council instead called the police to remove the cover. As doing so is not explicitly permitted (or prohibited) for civil parking enforcement and would need testing in the court, and they apparently did not want the bother or risk of that.
And I think in England it is only Cambridgeshire (excluding Cambridge and Peterborough) and Wealden in Sussex where the councils have not taken over responsibility for parking enforcement from the police.
