Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:

To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, if she will make an assessment of the potential merits of allowing local authorities to use automatic number plate recognition for car park management.

Local Authorities are allowed to use ANPR and associated recording equipment for enforcing both on and off-street parking contraventions. However, the use of ANPR by Local Authorities as the sole means for enforcing parking contraventions is forbidden under the Traffic Management Act 2004 (TMA) Regulations. This means that whilst local authorities can use ANPR, they cannot issue penalty charge notices via post following the detection of a parking contravention by ANPR in all but a very limited number of exceptions. Such exceptions include if the motorist drives away before the ticket can be issued, and certain on-street circumstances relating to bus lanes and red routes.

The rationale behind this restriction of ANPR usage is to make non-compliant motorists aware at the time that they have contravened a parking regulation. There are currently no plans to revise the TMA.