Parking-fine increase urged

Press, 27 May 1981, Page 6

Parking-fine increase urged

I The maximum $4 parking fine should be charged for a motorist’s first infringement, said the Christchurch City Council's public utilities committee yesterday. At present, the first fine is $3. City councillors had asked the Government to introduce a special $3 administration charge on each fine — to be paid if the first fine was not paid within 14 days — but the Minister of Transport (Mr McLachlan) said that maximum fines set by the Transport Act could not be exceeded. The council's first fine has stayed at $3 since 1967; remaining infringement fees have been increased to the maximum. Councillors have been concerned about the time it takes to recover many parking fines. They have argued that enforcement costs' could be lowered if people were encouraged to pay earlier. They have also been told that revenue for fines from non-metered, time-restricted parking spaces is a minor portion of total fines. It represented only 15 per cent of the fines in i 979, although there are about the same number of unmetered spaces (2000) as metdred in Christchurch. The committee's chairman, Cr Rex Lester, said that those figures and observa-

tions of enforcement procedures seemed to show that the Ministry of Transport did not police most metered areas.

If that were correct, time restriction signs on those spaces would be of little significance, he said.