Had a meeting last week with three people who are fighting the fight for fairness for motorists. In the wake of the revelations over Labour-run Haringey Council fining motorists for being in two yellow junction boxes in the borough which were illegally drawn – I am meeting them at their request. Some may regard it as supping with the devil – but that’s the point – motorists aren’t devils and they have as much right to fairness under the law as everyone else.

When I was Chair of Transport at the London Assembly I carried out an investigation publicly into parking enforcement in London. Judging from the visit I had from three borough leaders – yes one from each of the main parties – I was lucky not to end up with concrete boots in the Thames! The boroughs didn’t want me to look at this – and that just made me want to look harder. Without going into the findings – suffice to say – that income from parking etc. forms a standard part of the budget of many councils and therefore not all concerns by the motoring lobby are unfounded.

As someone who has often campaigned for parking restrictions and regulation – my concern is that they must be fair and reasonable – and they must be there for a good reason. The scrutiny at the London Assembly found many, many unfair practises and there were loads of recommendations. One – which I think Westminster took up – but not as strongly as I would have liked – is greater sensitivity to the severity of the offence. For example I don’t think that being a couple of minutes late back to a meter when time has expired should carry the same fine as a more serious infringement.

Back to my meeting last week. What Haringey’s illegal junction boxes boil down to is ‘unlawfully earned income’ – which in my view Haringey should therefore be refunding. (A view shared by at least one Labour councillor – Alan Stanton – though he has got into hot water with his colleagues for saying that in public).

Councils cannot and should not be above the law on such things. If we, the public, are to respect the laws and abide by them – they must be fair and be seen to be fair. And that includes the law applying to councils as well as to residents.

What is so interesting – is that if you get a ticket and the signing has been misleading or the junction box illegal – you can challenge it – and chances are that you will get your ticket written off. But there is no comeback on the firm/council/authority as a result. What I would prefer to see is that if it’s decided that you got a ticket wrongly – then there should also be scope for part of the ruling to be that the misleading sign or whatever must be changed.

Anyway – Cllr Martin Newton, who is the Liberal Democrat spokesperson for traffic etc on Haringey Council, attended the meeting with me and he is taking it forward at council level. I have written to the Chief Executive, however, to ask if Haringey is going to refund all the motorists who were illegally fined for the two yellow junction boxes. We will see!