Link Parking / Gladstones - unclear signage Court Defence by 23 July

Coupon-mad

The landowner authority appears to be expired, as you say, and is on Links' own notepaper (drafted by them then) and in the section about PERMITS it requires that 'the client' must display a permit at all times. The CLIENT? The Managing Agent?

Nothing in that contract says residents have any relevant obligation...only the stupid client who contracted with Link.

In the WS, you need to call them out on #29 at the hearing and put Martin Gardner on the spot about his incorrect and spuriously misleading citation of Vine, as explained by Johnersh (a solicitor poster) here:

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/73971817#Comment_73971817

''The Claimant appears to have led the Court to the Respondent's argument in Vine v London Borough of Waltham and, critically, NOT the ratio of the judgment from Roch LJ.''

psdie

Excellent points, thank you CM

The WS claims GLS are not under investigation by the SRA, contrary to a suggestion that this is the case by Stephen Doughty MP in the in 17/9/17 Commons debates of the Parking Bill:

What discussions is the Minister having with the Ministry of Justice and the Solicitors Regulation Authority, which I met a few months ago to raise concerns about a number of named companies, and which has advised me that it is looking at the practices of those firms and whether they are operating in an appropriate way? [..] I should be clear that that is Gladst*nes Solicitors in Knutsford ..

Is there more tangible proof of this SRA investigation that someone knows of, and something to show that Gladrags were specifically included?

Coupon-mad

No, but I would drop that line of defence as your opponent is not Gladstones.

psdie

Take your point - but my argument is that a competent solicitors firm would have taken one look at the photo of an unrestricted parking sign next to my vehicle and advised their client not to proceed with a claim with no reasonable prospect of success, which would have avoided wasting the court's valuable time. The claimant's choice of GSL to represent them, given their widely known roboclaims reputation, demonstrates IMO that the claimant was not interested in the merit of their case and sought instead to intimidate into settlement regardless.

I plan to use this (along with refusal to hear appeal unless driver identified, refusal to provide basic requested info like basis of claimed debt until literally their WS, and the raft of basic errors - changing amounts / descriptions, factual errors, etc) to argue for costs award on basis it shows unreasonable, vexatious behaviour.

I assume I am on solid ground to state that refusal to hear appeal unless the driver is identified is unreasonable and fails to fulfil their responsibilities under POFA to provide a robust appeals process before applying for Keeper details? Does this indeed count as a failure to meet the pre-requirements for POFA and invalidates their right to claim against the Keeper, as I propose in my Defence?

#27 claims that they have marked on the plan where the vehicle was parked. There's an ambiguous cross on the plan near the entrance which could either represent signage or the location of the vehicle, but doesn't match the location of either (as shown by evidence photos).

#32 and #35 state "lack of any general prohibition of entry on the signage" - when in fact the (obscured) Management Company entrance sign states "No Public Parking" (permit only) and the (distant) LP sign states parking only permitted for permit holders. This lack of prohibition is used as their claimed "relevant obligation" - yet the entrance sign in particular is clearly prohibitive and contradictory. Is the "prohibitive language" argument worth bothering with? I'm concerned it overly emphasises the "No Public Parking" language.

psdie

Wow, lying sods - #43 quotes from their signage but changes the wording to include "will incur an additional costs of £60". Their own evidence clearly shows the actual wording is "may incur additional costs" - no amount identified. Utterly deceptive.

Coupon-mad

I assume I am on solid ground to state that refusal to hear appeal unless the driver is identified is unreasonable and fails to fulfil their responsibilities under POFA to provide a robust appeals process before applying for Keeper details?

Yes it's unreasonable.

The DVLA told all parking firms in January 2014 - before the IPC started - the following:

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/64401866#Comment_64401866

a positive response from the DVLA, please see below:

Dear Mr XXXX,

Thank you for your patience in this matter.

The British Parking Association have now provided a response to myself.

The BPA have confirmed that this practice should not be occurring (as we already knew) and have taken steps to address this behaviour throughout the industry as this may not be an isolated incident.

The following message has now been issued by the BPA to all of their members...

'the following practices may be considered as Code breaches and must not be continued:
• Asking the motorist to enter into additional correspondence to obtain a POPLA code
• Failing to include a correct and/or valid POPLA Code within the Rejection correspondence
• Issuing a POPLA Code with a date identifier which is significantly different from the date of rejection
• Appearing to indicate that the issue of a POPLA Code is conditional on driver details being supplied
I am hoping that this type of incident will not be occurring any more.

I wish to thank you of bringing this matter to the DVLA's attention and ultimately, the BPA's.

If you do encounter any further issues such as this, please do not hesitate to contact myself.

Kind regards

And then once the IPC rocked up soon after that and rounded up a motley crew of PPCs desperate for a laxer CoP, this happened:

http://parking-prankster.blogspot.com/2015/10/how-independent-parking-committee.html

Following pressure from the DVLA and consumers, the code of practice was changed.

The requirement to name the driver at the IAS appeal stage remained, but following pressure from the DVLA this was removed, although the code of practice was not updated. Instead, on appealing the keeper was required to state whether they were the driver at the time, were not the driver at the time or did not want to state whether they were the driver.

Conclusion

It appears that the IPC have successfully bamboozled the DVLA into letting them remove the right to appeal from vehicle keepers.

Also see:

http://parking-prankster.blogspot.com/2015/09/how-independend-parking-committee.html

Notice to Keeper

Old CoP: ''6.4 The keeper must be told that the process of appealing within your internal appeals process
and the IAS.''

The requirement to allow keepers to be able to appeal has been removed.

The right of a keeper to appeal is a fundamental protection. It was a clear condition of government that the motorists should have access as a condition of the Protection of Freedoms Act Schedule 4 going live. The Prankster believes that ATA status should be removed from the IPC until the right for keepers to appeal has been restored.

Conclusion

It is obvious that every change has been made to the detriment of the motorist and without good reason. This is what happens when the DVLA allows a rogue ATA to have full control of its code of practice. The Prankster therefore backs the BPA's call for a single industry-wide code of practice, maintained by an independent body.

Until the IPC gets its house in order and reverts back to a fair code of practice, restoring at least signage requirements, and the ability for keepers to appeal, the DVLA should suspend its ATA status.

All of the above happened in 2015 and that's certainly unreasonable, given the starting position of the DVLA and the IPC's first CoP which they then watered down once they had ATA status.

psdie wrote: »

Wow, lying sods - #43 quotes from their signage but changes the wording to include "will incur an additional costs of £60". Their own evidence clearly shows the actual wording is "may incur additional costs" - no amount identified. Utterly deceptive.

Yes, indeed.

If you really go to town on unreasonableness to meet that very high bar, you could get a huge amount of costs. Create a stand alone document about their unreasonableness, blow by blow - pages long, to hand to the Judge when it comes to the matter of costs.

psdie

Wonderful, thank you CM - fantastic find! :j I'll digest that further now - a few final observations on their WS:

#47 tries to turn my Defence 7.4.2 (Consumer Rights Act 2015) into a colloquial interpretation of the word "fair" - but of course I'm referring to the Act's definition of Fair, which includes in Schedule 2 the following example of an unfair alleged contract term:

(10) A term which has the object or effect of irrevocably binding the consumer to terms with which the consumer has had no real opportunity of becoming acquainted before the conclusion of the contract.

#48 - any idea how they could justify claiming I didn't file a DPA Section 10 notice with them, when the e-mail chain clearly shows this being expressed multiple times?

Coupon-mad

This is stuff I remember from 2015 so it was easy to look up - I have a good memory for details, as parking firms and any others who bother me, know to their cost.



As for your questions, you are discovering that PPCs will tell lies and more lies, and they hope you will not notice. Keep digging!

psdie

I will - and I will be pushing for full costs (with write-up here after) - there needs to be a clear disincentive for PPCs to behave like this.

In terms of the overall structure of my WS - rather than repeat the bulk of my Defence wording, which I believe mainly stands its own in the face of their WS counter-arguments, would it be sensible to state the key facts of the case and then present a short summary of my primary arguments (~1 page), plus a further short section highlighting key flaws in their counter-arguments?

I'm thinking of leading into it with something like: "Given the Claimant has already inappropriately used its Witness Statement to present brand new legal arguments, I will take the opportunity now to summarise the key Defence arguments and respond to key misleading aspects of the Claimant's Witness Statement."

Also, any idea what to do if the judge asks me face to face to identify the driver? I assume can't / bad idea to refuse - but worth asking to be allowed not to name them, perhaps with a legal justification (I have no idea what terminology to use)?

Coupon-mad

You could say the date/location is unremarkable and you'd need evidence from the Claimant to even have a chance to recall (if ever a person could 100% recall where their car was and who was driving it on a date months ago...). And there has been none.

Say that more than one person drives your car, and is insured either on it, or in their own right so they can drive any car. Therefore on the balance of probabilities it was not you (e.g. 3 possible drivers means only a 33.3% chance it was you...and the Claimant has not tipped the balance of probabilities with any evidence at all, so you have had to defend this as registered keeper). You could cover this in your skeleton argument briefly and take a copy of the insurance policy to show the Judge if asked - that should work.