Parking (Code of Practice) Act 2019

Lord Spellar Excerpts

Tuesday 24th March 2026 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

A parking regulator was considered as an option in the options assessment published last year. However, it was dismissed as disproportionate. Establishing a regulator would have involved significant cost, complexity and even further delay, duplicating functions that can be delivered more efficiently through the 2019 Act and existing sanctions, including access to DVLA data.

[Lord Spellar (Lab)]

I put it to my noble friend the Minister that wheel clamping took some 20 years from the Scottish courts declaring it illegal in Scotland, against lots of obstructionism within officialdom in the Department for Transport and other departments, to finally being banned in England. We must know now what we want to do. Motorists are still being ripped off, companies are still behaving badly, and the appeals system often does not work. Should we not just take action and get on with it? It might even be rather popular.

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

It would be popular with me, but we need to make sure, once we put something in place, that it is legally robust and understands the impacts that the code will have—that is really important. We consulted on the appeals process last year to understand the concerns that motorists have with it—I have also heard many concerns from around the House when we have discussed this before—and we are working to address them. Is it very important that motorists have confidence in the appeals process and trust that they will get the right outcome as quickly as possible. For motorists, this means ensuring that appeal decisions are fair and, importantly, that those decisions are made independently from the private parking industry.