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Bristol City Council - CAZ - A4 Hotwell Road CAZ0001
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Hi all,

I've received a PCN for driving through Bristol City Council's Clean Air Zone on the 03/02/2024 and not paying the charge.

Of course I would like to appeal this, as from some reading it would appear that is unlawful to request the daily charge and penalty.
But before I go head I would like to make sure that I do have grounds to appeal.

I've attached the PCN.

Thanks in advance.


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Re: Bristol City Council - CAZ - A4 Hotwell Road CAZ0001
« Reply #1 on: »
Quote
Of course I would like to appeal this, as from some reading it would appear that is unlawful to request the daily charge and penalty.
But before I go head I would like to make sure that I do have grounds to appeal.

Bristol have rectified the telephone number. There is still the odd pagination (where are the other 296 pages?) but not sufficient. That leaves the demand for the toll+penalty.

Use the search box (top r-h corner) on ' Bristol CAZ' to find other recent threads (I think you'll find Bristol have yet to go to TPT), and post a draft representation here for constructive comment.

Do not miss deadline for maintaining discount.
« Last Edit: March 04, 2024, 12:11:25 pm by John U.K. »

Re: Bristol City Council - CAZ - A4 Hotwell Road CAZ0001
« Reply #2 on: »
Thanks for the response.

Would the be acceptable?

Dear Bristol City Council,

I challenge liability for PCN BS58819137 on the basis of a procedural impropriety.
There is no power in Regulation 7 of the The Road User Charging Schemes (Penalty Charges, Adjudication and Enforcement) (England) Regulations 2013, for the PCN to require the CAZ charge to be paid in addition to the penalty charge.
This is confirmed in an adjudication at the Traffic Penalty Tribunal in 2018, Luke Moran v Secretary of State for Transport, case No: IA01249-1803.

Therefore, I am requesting the cancellation of this PCN.

Re: Bristol City Council - CAZ - A4 Hotwell Road CAZ0001
« Reply #3 on: »
I have attached the TPT case of 2018.  The key sentences are: -
Quote
There is no power in Regulation 7 for the PCN to require the road user charge to be paid in
addition to the penalty charge. Nor is there a power for the charging authority to refuse to
allocate a payment made for a crossing to that crossing, and hold it, possibly indefinitely, for
future use.
The case concerned a late payment of the toll, but the first sentence above applies to all PCNs.
Here is a link to the regulations: -
https://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2013/1783/regulation/7/made

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Re: Bristol City Council - CAZ - A4 Hotwell Road CAZ0001
« Reply #4 on: »
@Tiggerbits please could you confirm that you've sent a representation?
I practice law in the Traffic Penalty Tribunal, London Tribunals, the First-tier tribunal for Scotland, and the Traffic Penalty Tribunal for Northern Ireland, but I am not a solicitor or a barrister. Notwithstanding this, I voluntarily apply the cab rank rule. I am a member of the Society of Professional McKenzie Friends, my membership number is FM193 and I abide by the SPMF service standards.

Quote from: 'Gumph' date='Thu, 19 Jan 2023 - 10:23'
cp8759 is, indeed, a Wizard of the First Order

Re: Bristol City Council - CAZ - A4 Hotwell Road CAZ0001
« Reply #5 on: »
Hello,

Sorry for the delay.

I did indeed send representations, however today I have received a letter advising that my representations have been rejected.

I will upload an image of the latter shortly.

Thanks

Re: Bristol City Council - CAZ - A4 Hotwell Road CAZ0001
« Reply #6 on: »
I have attached the letter I have received.

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Re: Bristol City Council - CAZ - A4 Hotwell Road CAZ0001
« Reply #7 on: »
Nice of them to show they've now actually read the regulations.  I don't expect they even knew they existed before !  They are right that the regs allow them to state in their Order that the penalty charge is payable in addition to the toll charge. However, it seems they never got as far as Regulation 7, that defines the content of a PCN. There are no powers in Regulation 7 that permit the toll charge to be requested on the PCN. If they want to collect the toll charge, they must use normal debt recovery procedures.

Re: Bristol City Council - CAZ - A4 Hotwell Road CAZ0001
« Reply #8 on: »
Hi,

You probably are correct, however the wording in the does make it appear, at least to a layperson like myself, that the council are correct.

(4) A charging scheme is to specify whether a penalty charge referred to in paragraph (1) or (2) is payable in addition to the road user charge or instead of such charge.

If you can help me understand that would be great.
Is it the lack of explicitly defining a rule to allow the ability to request both the charge and the toll at the same time that prevents them from how the power to do so?

Re: Bristol City Council - CAZ - A4 Hotwell Road CAZ0001
« Reply #9 on: »
Whoever wrote the regulations was an idiot, but councils must obey the regulations, and those regulations do not permit them to claim the toll charge on the PCN, as was stated in 2018, by Caroline Sheppard, the Chief Adjudicator of the Traffic Penalty Tribunal.  However, as far as can be made out, this ruling has never been tested since. I see they have re-offered the discount, so it is now your decision whether to take them to TPT or pay up. If it were me, I'd be going to the TPT, but it's your money not mine.

Interestingly, the Birmingham CAZ Order specifically states that payment of the PCN discharges the toll charge debt. Their lawyers are obviously more up-to-speed than Bristol's.

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Re: Bristol City Council - CAZ - A4 Hotwell Road CAZ0001
« Reply #10 on: »
@Tiggerbits

It's not intuitive.

The regulations are clear that they are entitled to demand the £9. And thus your view is a reasonable one.

But the issue is the regulations which allow the penalty are explicit in what must be on a penalty charge notice. It doesn't include the £9.

They can send you an invoice and sue you for the £9.

It may be a reasonble view that asking you for it via the pcn seems pragmatic, but it doesn't make it right.

They have so far always backed down. I would like to see a case go to tribunal solely on this narrow point. If the discount were gone there would be nothing to lose.
« Last Edit: April 26, 2024, 11:01:45 am by slapdash »

Re: Bristol City Council - CAZ - A4 Hotwell Road CAZ0001
« Reply #11 on: »
I agree that the tribunal route is the way to go, an adjudicator is unlikely to go out of their way to disagree with their own logic from 2018.

Having said that, I'm a contrarian type, so I wondered about using their own logic against them by paying the £69 then demanding the £60 back because they've now accepted payment of the £9. This ought to work if the penalty is for non-payment, but not if it's for late payment. The order itself ("Bristol Clean Air Zone Charging Order 2022" I think) is unclear which is the case, section 11 (1) says says the penalty is "A penalty charge will be payable.... [when] ...that charge has not been paid in full in the manner in which and within the time by which it is required..." but the section heading is "Penalty charge for non-payment of charge"

I did fid something else interesting though, Section 9 (4) of the Bristol Clean Air Zone Charging Order 2022 states:

"(4) A licence may only be purchased—
(a) on the charging day concerned;
(b) on any of the first six charging days immediately following that charging day; or
(c) on a day falling within a period of six charging days immediately preceding that
charging day"

... so if you do go to the tribunal you could point out that Bristol's own order doesn't allow them to accept late payments.
« Last Edit: April 26, 2024, 11:45:42 am by Grant Urismo »
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Re: Bristol City Council - CAZ - A4 Hotwell Road CAZ0001
« Reply #12 on: »
To my simple view that feels like another string of "penalty exceeds".

Re: Bristol City Council - CAZ - A4 Hotwell Road CAZ0001
« Reply #13 on: »
@Tiggerbits it seems to me that Caroline Sheppard's reading of the regulations is correct, and if the council wants the £9 charge they can ask but they cannot demand payment of the £9 charge as part of the PCN process. They can send you an invoice and if you don't pay, they can sue you in the county court small claims track.

I'm going to drop you a PM in case you'd like to be represented.
I practice law in the Traffic Penalty Tribunal, London Tribunals, the First-tier tribunal for Scotland, and the Traffic Penalty Tribunal for Northern Ireland, but I am not a solicitor or a barrister. Notwithstanding this, I voluntarily apply the cab rank rule. I am a member of the Society of Professional McKenzie Friends, my membership number is FM193 and I abide by the SPMF service standards.

Quote from: 'Gumph' date='Thu, 19 Jan 2023 - 10:23'
cp8759 is, indeed, a Wizard of the First Order

Re: Bristol City Council - CAZ - A4 Hotwell Road CAZ0001
« Reply #14 on: »
Hi all,

Just a  quick reply for now. Thank you for your input. I'll have a full read and digest what has been said.
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