A Summary of the Beavis Case

TDA

bargepole wrote: »

No, that's not what I'm saying, and nor will the QC.


The Judges were right in saying that a deterrent clause has to be extravagant and unconscionable to pass the test of whether it's a penalty, but then they failed to make a comparison with the 'greatest loss that could have been suffered', (in this case £0) which is where we believe they went wrong.

In fairness, at the case itself they seemed to be aware the greatest conceivable loss was £0. They repeatedly asked what the actual loss was and John Kirk essentially accepted there was none, stating that there is an attractiveness in the free parking facilities being paid for by the minority of defaulters.

Granted they didn't pick up on the point in the judgment itself, but I don't think it was outside their consideration.

The crucial point, I feel, will be whether the Supreme Court accepts that there are the same policy considerations at play that the Court of Appeal felt there were.

If those policy considerations weren't at issue I hardly feel we would have seen the reframing of the test in the classical Dunedin language of extravagant and unconscionable, and a move away from deterrence (despite a penalty being described as in terrorm in the same judgment!). There would have been no need.

Marktheshark

Basically they said it can not be a penalty because councils charge a similar amount.
Completely missing the "clue is in the name" ..Fixed Penalty Charge that councils issue which are a penalty, a punishment.
Now it is illegal to criticize the judiciary so I wont say these old farts need to be made to live in the real world for a few weeks.

£100 to a High Court appeal judge is his Dinner money if he skips the wine.
For a working family its a weeks housekeeping money.
Children may have to go without food and clothes so this greedy outfit of parking cowboys can sip the champers on the yacht .

Northlakes

What the CofA missed was the 'ethics' of the case in that PE PAID the landowner for the privilege of issuing PCN's. The cost of this opportunism would fall on the unsuspecting, the unlucky and the chancers in equal measure whether they overstayed 10 minutes or 5 hours. According to this branch of the judiciary this may be lawful but to most of us it defies understanding of how this can cost the ordinary person £85 and then describe this as unconscionable.

bargepole

Northlakes wrote: »

What the CofA missed was the 'ethics' of the case in that PE PAID the landowner for the privilege of issuing PCN's. The cost of this opportunism would fall on the unsuspecting, the unlucky and the chancers in equal measure whether they overstayed 10 minutes or 5 hours. According to this branch of the judiciary this may be lawful but to most of us it defies understanding of how this can cost the ordinary person £85 and then describe this as unconscionable.

They didn't miss it, in fact it's mentioned in the Judgment, but they also said that the arrangements between PE and the landowner are irrelevant.


At one stage, one of the Judges said that in an ideal world, PE would want every visitor to the car park to stay for 2 hours and 5 minutes. We thought, at that point, that they had begun to realise what a nonsense the whole scheme was, but they passed over that and focused on the public policy aspects.

bazster

bargepole wrote: »

No, that's not what I'm saying, and nor will the QC.


The Judges were right in saying that a deterrent clause has to be extravagant and unconscionable to pass the test of whether it's a penalty, but then they failed to make a comparison with the 'greatest loss that could have been suffered', (in this case £0) which is where we believe they went wrong.

Yes, thanks, that's what I mean: they can't be allowed to go unchallenged in removing loss from the picture.

bazster

carandbike wrote: »

There is no evidence to suggest commuters would park at Riverside and walk. If there was a case for this, surely they would currently be paying the not too extravagant £4.50 or £6.80 per day that the council charge next door to the retail park and walk from there. The car park website states a ten minute walk from the station and I'd say that's more accurate than five minutes.

Don't underestimate what many people will do to save £4.50! We had a case on here recently where someone parked at my home-town Morrisons, walked to the station and went to London. That Morrisons is a good 20-minute walk from the station!

I'm not familiar with the Chelmsford site but if it's a 5-10 minute walk from the station I can well believe commuters would park there if they could. Which is not to say that the ParkingEye regime is the correct response to that issue, it most certainly isn't.

bazster

TDA wrote: »

The crucial point, I feel, will be whether the Supreme Court accepts that there are the same policy considerations at play that the Court of Appeal felt there were.

"On the ground", as it were, policy considerations certainly are in play. That's not to say the CoA judges were correct to take those considerations into account: it's not their job to descry, uphold or support the policies of a business, their job is to apply the law to the case in front of them.

nigelbb

bazster wrote: »

Don't underestimate what many people will do to save £4.50! We had a case on here recently where someone parked at my home-town Morrisons, walked to the station and went to London. That Morrisons is a good 20-minute walk from the station!

I'm not familiar with the Chelmsford site but if it's a 5-10 minute walk from the station I can well believe commuters would park there if they could. Which is not to say that the ParkingEye regime is the correct response to that issue, it most certainly isn't.

Riverside Retail is a 10 minute walk from Chelmsford station according to Google maps. https://www.google.co.uk/maps/dir/Chelmsford+CM1+1HT,+UK/51.7378164,0.4792316/@51.7371419,0.4715753,17z/data=!3m1!4b1!4m9!4m8!1m5!1m1!1s0x47d8ebda18587af7:0x862e7a6a1de6ee2f!2m2!1d0.4686933!2d51.7364674!1m0!3e2

The provision of parking at the station is grossly inadequate for the demand as I have found out to my cost. If you arrive later than about 07:45 there are no spaces in the multi-storey car park adjacent to the station. High Chelmer Shopping Centre is the next nearest at a 6 minute walk away but costs £18 for over 8 hours. The Leisure Centre & Ice Rink council car park across the road from Riverside Retail park is also a 10 minute walk from the station & costs £6.80 for over 4 hours.

Northlakes

I can understand how in the Beavis case there is no immediate loss to either party but that the CofA judged that there was a commercial justification by PE in the claim.

However what I can't get my head round is the fact that unusually PE paid the landowner (unlike most of its operations). There was also the fact that there was reduction in allowed time of parking from 3 hours to 2 hours. Did the Beavis defence enquire or allege the landowner and operator jointly conspired to encourage breaches for joint gain to the detriment of a third party?

hoohoo

bazster wrote: »

Don't underestimate what many people will do to save £4.50! We had a case on here recently where someone parked at my home-town Morrisons, walked to the station and went to London. That Morrisons is a good 20-minute walk from the station!

I'm not familiar with the Chelmsford site but if it's a 5-10 minute walk from the station I can well believe commuters would park there if they could. Which is not to say that the ParkingEye regime is the correct response to that issue, it most certainly isn't.

If they are prepared to walk 10 minutes to the station I'm sure they are also prepared to put a plastic bag over their numberplate when they leave. ParkingEye is not the solution; they do not catch long term abusers - only genuine shoppers.