Parking in own space - Gladstoned

[Deleted User]

Case Lost. More details to follow but - the judge, "did you display the parking permit at any time?". Defendant, "yes". Judge, "in that case you accepted the contract. Case dismissed, leave to appeal refused, pay £200 in next 21 days".

Le_Kirk

Wow, does this mean that anybody in a permit situation (presumably own space) will ALWAYS have to display a permit, can never have it blown off by the wind or shaken off by unscrupulous parking hitlers because they have once displayed it and have accepted a contract? To me then it makes more sense NEVER to display a permit in case you get caught in the trap of being seen to have accepted the contract. Of course, the next case in a different court with a different judge might have a different outcome.




ETA oh and btw, bad luck on the outcome

[Deleted User]

Unlucky.

Were you permitted to address the bolt on costs? The signage would presumably have clearly have set the costs at £100 and "MAY seek additional costs" is not the same as will or are entitled to...

I thought he was moving in? He can't have had a permit at that point or any of established pattern of doing so, surely?

[Deleted User]

Some further details about this lost case. Please note that I was not present at the hearing and what follows is a summary of a discussion I had with the defendant.


Background. The defendant failed to display his parking permit when moving into a new property and parking in his own space, as specified in the property lease. Having received a windscreen ticket he then displayed the permit for subsequent use of his own parking space. He displayed the permit when subsequently parking simply to avoid further ticketing.


Court. The hearing took place in central London, about 75 miles from the defendant's home. The hearing commenced some five hours after the scheduled time. The defendant lost an entire working day as a result, and had to pay the train fare to visit London. The courtroom was an actual courtroom, as per a criminal court, with the judge sitting up on high, in a dominating position; acoustics were poor.


The judge (I'll confirm who it was when I find out) did not have a copy of our witness statement. We had posted a copy to the court two weeks prior to the hearing and had proof of postage. The judge laughed this off with a comment along the lines of "stuff does get lost in the post". Accordingly he had only read our defence statement prior to the hearing - apparently. He was clearly in a rush and had the demeanour of someone who couldn't really be bothered with this type of 'trivia'.


The hearing. Early on, the defendant was ambushed by the judge, when he was asked "did you at any time display the parking permit?" The answer was "Yes". Without waiting for further explanation the judge stated "in that case you entered into a contract with the parking company". The answer should presumably have been "no - I used the permit to tell the parking company that this is my place and I'm entitled to park in it". An easy response in retrospect, but not so easy in the heat of the moment. The judge was not interested in primacy of contract, nor in any previous cases, including an almost identical, and recent, case (we didn't have a copy of the case transcript, but did have the case number) where the defendant won.


The judge ruled in favour of the claimant, but reduced the "fine" from the claimed £260 to £200 and ordered payment to be made within 21 days (a minor point - I thought it was always 30 days). Leave for appeal was refused. The judge stated (paraphrased) - "it'll cost you a significant amount of money to appeal, and you'll lose anyway".


Lessons learnt. The defendant was on his own (I live over 300 miles away). It would have been much better if he was accompanied by a lay representative, ideally someone with legal knowledge, but presumably anyone would be better than no one.


No matter how strong your case, it seems there's always a chance that it will be handled by a rogue judge, so assume nothing.


We put a massive amount of effort into preparing documents for this case, and it was all brushed aside, and for the most part not even considered, or even read, by the judge. So, I'm thinking that if ever we get another parking invoice we'll totally ignore it until such time as it goes to court - if it ever does.


I looked into complaining about the conduct of the judge (not the finding). It seems like there's the usual obstacle course in place for anyone going down that track.


Thanks to everyone who offered help and advice in this thread. I'm sure with a different judge there would have been a different finding. Unfortunately we perhaps came up against a legal chump.

Coupon-mad

That's a real shame and an example of what we call 'DJ lottery':

No matter how strong your case, it seems there's always a chance that it will be handled by a rogue judge, so assume nothing.

Yep.

It would only cost £110 (or is it £120) as a court fee to appeal (nothing if the D qualifies for help with fees) and they could consider applying, despite not being given that right on the day.

However they would need to apply for the transcript of this farce of a hearing, to let a senior Judge decide, and attend another hearing...so prohibitively expensive if it's 75 miles away too.

Absolutely shocking decision and an injustice that the DJ was so dismissive and couldn't be arsed to find the WS & evidence and properly consider the facts.

beamerguy

The judge ruled in favour of the claimant, but reduced the "fine" from the claimed £260 to £200 and ordered payment to be made within 21 days (a minor point - I thought it was always 30 days). Leave for appeal was refused. The judge stated (paraphrased) - "it'll cost you a significant amount of money to appeal, and you'll lose anyway".

At least the fake £60 was dismissed.

I only wish the county court system is overhauled because judges like this should really be farmed out to grass.

If you did appeal, how would he/she know if another judge would make such a decision. Judges are not there to give such ridiculous verbals. Saying "and you'll lose anyway" is a total disgrace
A VERY SAD JUDGE

[Deleted User]

Absolutely shocking decision and an injustice that the DJ was so dismissive

But not outwith his remit. It depends on the day and even the o/p now recognises the submissions could've been better - that's trial risk. That is virtually impossible to eliminate. I am, however deeply sympathetic, when the permit was only ever displayed after the event for an easier life!

I only wish the county court system is overhauled because judges like this should really be farmed out to grass.

Good luck with that. The govt assigns little more than £600 per annum per DJ for their training and less than £150 for lay magistrates. This is the face of government cuts and is unlikely to be improved in a post Brexit era if any element of industry, e.g. farming, requires or receives the type of financial support that has been mooted.

(That is obviously an unknown quantity at the moment, and an entirely different point, save that it illustrates why changes are unlikely).

The_Deep

The govt assigns little more than £600 per annum per DJ for their training and less than £150 for lay magistrates.

Good Lord, I have been on "be nice to ethnic minorities" one day courses that cost more than that.

[Deleted User]

A couple of final points, then I'll probably wrap up this thread. The scammers will have made a financial loss on this, so is the £200 the final amount payable - they won't come back with further costs?


Mention above was made about appealing against the decision. The defendant doesn't want to do this, but I might look at it further (and foot any costs myself). Are there any examples of how such appeals have worked out? Thanks.

[Deleted User]

If you've been ordered to pay "X" rather than "X with costs to be assessed" then X is the limit of the liability.