It’s time to fire up the Quattro, or pull the dust cloth off the 2CV, and put on Fleetwood Mac’s The Chain. The war on motorists has come to an end, and by the sunglasses of Enzo Ferrari, does it feel good. For years motorists have been painted as the enemy. Othered by cyclists and environmentalists, they have been congestion charged and pushed out of major urban areas by “park-and-ride” schemes. Milked for all their worth by police forces and local authorities alike, drivers have been fined, taxed and squeezed for years, demonised and shamed into coughing up money to pay for free gym memberships for local authorities, or PR officers for police forces so that they can spin the justification of all those speed cameras. There are about 36 million drivers in the UK, and the government is beginning to recognise that we have been pushed too far.
First came the news that many car parking fines issued on private land may be illegal after the Protection of Freedoms Act 2012 banned clamping, towing, blocking in or immobilising a vehicle without lawful authority on private land. This legal reform sought to end the obscene charges levied by private landowners at the expense of unwitting motorists. In my experience, it is always those who are cash- or time-poor who end up with such fines. The greater punishment inflicted on those who cannot afford to pay straight away, the ramping up of fees by private companies, was a further punishment on the most vulnerable. In many rural areas, a car is the only viable means of transport. For struggling families with children, the train is prohibitively expensive and the bus often inconvenient. The driver is not just the economic backbone of our economy, but often the person who cannot afford to sit back and enjoy a train journey.
The latest, blissfully welcome news is that Eric Pickles, the communities secretary, has cottoned on to the “overzealous parking enforcement” by local authorities. Pickles has an eye for ideas that appeal to the public imagination, so it comes as no surprise that the minister who flies the EU flag in an abandoned basement room of his department is on the side of the man driving up the Clapham Road. Pickles has reminded councils that they are banned from “using parking to generate profit” and is going to ban them from using CCTV “spy cars” outside strict no-parking zones.
The greatest triumph will be the introduction of a 10-minute grace period before drivers are fined if they stay too long in council-owned parking spaces. This is a welcome recognition of the realities of everyday life: the queue at the bank, being caught short, not being able to find an ingredient in the supermarket. It is a human policy, a forgiving approach to our behaviour, which finally concedes that parking restrictions should not be applied in a draconian manner. It is a commonsense, even generous, approach to government.
As a cyclist who has been knocked off my bike in London by a car, of course I welcome the reduction of speed limits in central areas, but this should be met with commensurate increases on the speed limits of our motorways. For too long, cyclists and drivers have been set against one another, ignoring the reality that many drivers enjoy cycling and vice versa. We design and build beautiful cars in this country, our motoring heritage is a valuable export of which we should be exceptionally proud. Public transport is not the answer to every journey, and we mustn’t forget that pushing through the gears on an empty stretch of country road is skin-tingling fun. From James Bond’s Aston Martin and the Minis from The Italian Job, to the Nissans coming off the production line in Sunderland, motoring is enmeshed in our culture and economy.
Whether you enjoy the thrill of driving or are just prepared to understand and accept that motoring is an economic and social lifeline for millions, these new limits on parking enforcement should be welcomed. Higher speed limits on motorways should be introduced alongside stricter emission controls and incentives for people to trade in older, less efficient vehicles for hybrid and electric cars. But this announcement from Pickles is great news. To the frustration of parking zealots around the country, this is a war that we have won.
