need help compiling defence for county court business centre claim

ranaboy

Thankyou Coupon-mad I will read through these WS you have suggested and start compiling

ranaboy

 Good morning.

Thankyou again to the resources on this forum, I have tried to understand as much as I can before my deadline for submission of the witness statement.

 I have used the defence template and changed it as laid out below.

 @Coupon-mad I have taken some elements from the exemplaries you noted, I hope this is reasonable.

 I have found this drawn out process incredibly stressful and have at times thought about just paying the full amount, unsure of whether I am at fault or will be further penalised.

The contravention is a long time ago and a lot has happened in my life since then.

Thankyou for the help and support.

Any thoughts/criticism is welcomed

Kind Regards

1. I am xxxxxxxx the registered keeper and driver of the vehicle.

2. I parked at said location on 17 of April 2019. I do not live in this town, this is almost four years ago and the exact actions and timings are to the best of my knowledge and memory.

3. I thought parking was freely available and provided at no cost by the retail establishments as no other roadside parking appeared available.  No parking attendant, barrier,machine or clear parking terms were seen or encountered by myself.  The site of this parking charge no longer exists as a retail establishment in the same form, however  Exhibit A  shows a photo of the carpark in question taken before its demolition which in my view does not show clear signage.

4. Therefore I do not feel that I knowingly breached the car park terms and conditions.

5. The Claimant is put to strict proof that, at the time of the parking event that the signage was evident, correct and clearly visible on this road in question.

6. In the alternative, if the Claimant alleges signage was present, I aver that the small signs had vague/hidden terms and a mix of small font, and are considered incapable of binding a driver. Consequently, it remains my position that no contract to pay an onerous penalty was seen or agreed

7. as per template

8.  This particular Claimant's legal reperesentative continues to pursue a hugely disproportionate fixed sum of £60 recovery costs with added interest to the claim at 8% (£49.88) from the date of the offence (routinely added per PCN) despite knowing that this is now banned. It is denied that the quantum sought is recoverable (authorities: two well-known ParkingEye cases where modern penalty law rationale was applied).  Attention is drawn to paras 98, 100, 193, 198 of ParkingEye Ltd v Beavis [2015] UKSC67.  Also ParkingEye Ltd v Somerfield Stores Ltd ChD [2011] EWHC 4023(QB) where the parking charge was £75, discounted to £37.50 for prompt payment.  Whilst £75 was reasonable, HHJ Hegarty (sitting at the High Court; later ratified by the CoA) held in paras 419-428 that unspecified 'admin costs' inflating it to £135 'would appear to be penal'.

The rest of the statement is as per the template

ranaboy

Exhibit A.

Coupon-mad

Remind us: are you past the CCJ set aside stage, and are you now submitting a defence as well as your WS about the PCN?  Defence and WS together?

Or did you already send your defence to the Judge after the set aside hearing?  

ranaboy

I am at the stage of submitting a witness statement before a small claims track

ranaboy

I have already submitted a defence using the template

ranaboy

I am at this stage, compiling a witness statement

ranaboy

I have not been sent any documents by the claimant yet.

I am adapting the defence template into a witness statement to reflect my situation using other examples that have been selected as exemplars.

ranaboy

letter from court

ranaboy

This is where I am so far...

https://www.dropbox.com/s/q2xyt0n72bo8ibv/witness statement (2).pdf?dl=0