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Review of 2007Enforcing traffic penalty charges against foreign vehicle drivers is no longer considered a minor issue and the domain of local authorities.SPARKS Programme activities over the last two years have seen the issue rise up the political agenda and catch the attention of Her Majesty’s Government. Early DaysSPARKS began as the Shared Parking and Registered Keeper information Services research project in April 2005, assessing the feasibility of a network linking London’s local authorities with vehicle registration agencies in other EU member states, either directly or via the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency (DVLA).It quickly became clear that the legal environment was more critical than technology. From September onwards the focus changed to an influencing campaign at local, national and European levels. One of the first pieces of work was the London Parking Managers Survey that October. It revealed a huge discrepancy between owners of UK and foreign registered vehicles paying penalty charge notices and significant numbers of repeat offenders. Most London boroughs did not enforce penalty charges issued to foreign vehicles. They knew from experience that there were no data sharing mechanisms to trace owners and no judicial mechanisms to enforce debts across borders. Data SharingSPARKS focused on understanding these two issues and identifying practical solutions. Approaches to licensing agencies in each EU member state revealed just eight were willing and able to share vehicle and owner data.Subsequently, the Dutch licensing authority RDW, agreed to work with London to create a treaty as a legal basis for reciprocal enforcement of penalties, and to pilot data access processes. However, the treaty and pilot were scuppered when Department of Transport lawyers said it was beyond the remit of the DVLA to receive or share data with other licensing agencies. Expert advice also put paid to a speedy legal remedy. Between October and January SPARKS discussed the applicability of COPEN 24 (Council Framework Decision 2005/214/JHA) and the Brussels 1 Regulation ( 44/2001) with the Department of Constitutional Affairs and the Home Office. Their advice, and that of independent counsel, was that there was no legal remedy in EU civil or criminal law that would allow enforcement of UK decriminalised penalties across borders. They added that UK decriminalised enforcement was considered administrative rather than civil within the EU and that no programmes were planned to address mutual recognition of administrative decisions. Influencing PoliticiansFrom summer 2006 the SPARKS Programme regularly met with senior civil servants to explain cross-border enforcement issues and solicit support for changes to UK and EU law. Top of the list was new powers for the DVLA to act as a UK hub for handling vehicle and owner data on behalf of local authorities.This influencing campaign began to be effective in 2007 as politicians across the political spectrum recognised the consequences of foreign vehicle owners ignoring traffic laws; backbenchers, peers and shadow ministers began to ask questions in Westminster. However, many of their questions were not answered, either because of cost or availability. In effect the government was saying it didn’t know the scale or impact of foreign vehicles ignoring UK traffic laws because it was not monitoring the issue. FRV ActivitySPARKS response was to commission independent research that for the first time provided a comprehensive view of foreign vehicle activity in the UK. This revealed a dramatic increase in foreign vehicles entering the UK, and a significant proportion breaking UK traffic laws and ignoring penalties issued to them.In July the research was launched at SPARKS first parliamentary reception for 80 people including MP and peers, local authorities from across the UK, the DVLA, Home Office and Metropolitan Police. Subsequently new Minister of State Rosie Winterton MP requested a meeting. At last, on 8 November 2007, government heeded SPARKS calls and revised the Local Transport Bill, giving DVLA new powers to receive data from foreign licensing agencies and share it with UK local authorities. European ResearchRunning in parallel with the UK research has been European Commission-funded Eurosparks research analysing existing legislation relating to mutual recognition, co-operation between court services and debt recovery.Eurosparks has identified three potential legal solutions – creation of a new directive within the EC Treaty, extension of COPEN 24 to cover all financial penalties, and multilateral or bilateral agreements between member states. Recommendations are being presented to the European Parliament in April 2008. During the coming year SPARKS is pushing for these recommendations to be turned into legislation. It is also following UK developments, especially data transfer powers for DVLA and urging European governments to systematically collect data on foreign registered cars. These make up 90 per cent of foreign vehicle traffic but very little information is gathered about them. |
Facts & Figures
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