Witness statement Draft for NTK

MissssyD

Thanks @Coupon-mad I mentioned in my opening statement that I wasn’t the driver and the man representing the claimant smirked and I explained that I received the WS with the pcn only two weeks ago. The judge said I should have stated that in my word statement I wasn’t the driver. I apologised to the judge. She said I didn’t mention that in my defence and I explained that I wasn’t sure how to proceed because I didn’t receive a pcn just letters demanding payment. One from a previous debt recovery and now dcbl. They even lied on their email which they replied to me claiming that they have sent everything on file!! Insinuating the pcn was sent to me and they never did only at witness statement stage 2 weeks before the hearing. Be careful if you do get DCBL include all correspondence from them and state everything they send you for future reference. Dcbl quoted pofa but the judge didnt ask for the legislation submitted in his witness statement only from my witness statement. I even had dvla request from highview showing they asked for evidence in January 2018 when the contravention happened in august 2017. The apnr captured this. 

I’m still in shock and think I even said that to the judge I’m in shock because at the final stage each person had to say something I physically couldn’t speak. Yes they let the rep have their charges. I did offer to have the pofa displayed on screen but the judge refused. She mentioned how much I had to pay. I also asked their rep how does the payment need to be made. 

My main defence was pofa ntk and also the signage and according to their submission they claimed there were 7 signs but none of them visible. I even pointed at one behind a bush and one bar the far wall, also stated that in 2018 the sign was facing the other way and the driver would have not seen it.  The judge said images were small so I pointed  out to another image about adverts displayed everywhere. 

I think because dvla hadn’t changed my address I think that went against me although the debt agencies had my new address.I just felt defeated when I tried talking about pofa and didn’t have the back up in my witness statement and then again for the 28days from BPA. I also mentioned APNR cameras also require that pofa be followed of pursing ntk. 

MissssyD

Correction it was approximately £330 typo error 

Coupon-mad

This is wrong (two errors in law). 

Firstly, about keeper liability because the Judge was unable to make a finding of fact that you were driving and was absolutely wrong in a failure to look at the evidence and apply the applicable law (the NTK was non POFA on date and wording).  If the Claimant was relying on the POFA then it was their burden to take the Judge to the applicable law, but they were NOT relying on the POFA (absolutely unable to) so the rep should never have misled the Judge on that point.  The Judge in turn, should not have expected a LiP Defendant to append or give chapter and verse on easily checked legislation which would have exposed the truth (non-POFA dates and wording) in five minutes.   It was sufficient for the Defendant to point out that the evidence showed she was not driving, and that the DVLA data was not obtained in time (even if you couldn't explain the fact that the NTK was also not worded under the POFA, and was incapable of 'keeper liability' by any interpretation.  So, that is an error in law and the Judge was wrong to come to the conclusion she did. 

Secondly, by allowing the rep's costs in a case where the Defendant had not acted unreasonably.  There is no reason to do that and the Judge erred.

It's appealable but that costs a fee and would be another hearing with a higher Judge - and I don't think you'd cope, would you?   See if @bargepole fancies testing an appeal where a NTK was very clearly non-POFA (their rep misled the court) and the NTK showed a face that wasn't you (first shown in evidence too late for you to respond until the hearing) and your evidence pointed out that they didn't even get DVLA data until months later.

It is impossible for you to be liable.

Not many appeals are worth trying but this one has legs and you should NEVER have to pay £330 as you were not liable.  At all.  And you said the right things.

But you'd need to pay an appeal fee and probably the costs of a transcript of this failure of a hearing, which is more than £330 altogether.  And Circuit Judges are lazy/useless/easily led by legal reps, in our experience, in understanding private parking law. 

You could pay for the transcript and appeal and still find a clueless Circuit Judge who also doesn't understand the simple words in Schedule 4.