11:47am Wednesday 18th August 2010
By Simon Carr
HAMPSHIRE motorists have welcomed the news that a clamping ban is to be imposed.
Wheel clampers are set to be banned from operating on private land in a bid to tackle rogue operators who exploit drivers by charging hundreds of pounds in release fees.
The Daily Echo has reported on a series of incidents in which motorists received getting fines of up to £500 after parking for just minutes in the wrong place.
Clamping firms were hitting motorists with financial penalties, tow truck fees, charges for paying by card and even threatening a £50 “rudeness fee” if they failed to spot their small warning signs.
The coalition Government will now impose new legislation that will outlaw clampers operating on private land.
Motorist Debbie Ludlam, 30, of Locks Heath, has been caught twice by clampers – once for parking outside her sister’s home for a hour, resulting in a £250 charge, and a second time for parking in the forecourt of the closed HQ Garage, in Northam, for 20 minutes as she tended to a sick child, resulting in a £275 release fee.
She said: “I’ve been clamped and I’ve been blocked in by someone, so I have been on both sides, but I hate clampers.
“The fines are ridiculously high and the system is completely unfair.
“I feel it is not about stopping people parking dangerously or in the wrong places but rather it is a money-making outfit.”
Mortgage manager Nick Carr, 28, of Bitterne, who was clamped at the same garage, said: “It think it’s obscene what they charge, it is like they believe they are a law unto themselves. I hope this forces the dodgy firms out of business.”
Announcing the new legislation yesterday the equalities and criminal i n f o r m a t i o n minister Lynne Feat h e r s t o n e said private firms would be banned from clamping or towing vehicles but would still be able to ticket parked cars.
Only the police and local authorities will have the power to tow vehicles away in exceptional circumstances.
More than 2,000 clamping licences will be revoked under the new legislation. Anybody using a clamp on private land could face a fine or even jail.
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