Consumer Protection (Private Car Parks) Bill

The Bill would require local authorities in England to introduce a licensing scheme for charging, publicly-available, privately-owned car parks.

The requirements on local authorities would be set out in regulations made by the Secretary of State by statutory instrument, and would include:

• the criteria which private parking operators must satisfy to acquire a licence
• the maximum level of fixed penalty charges which could be imposed under the licensing scheme
• provision for the costs incurred by each local authority in setting up and administering the licensing process to be recovered by a levy on private parking operators operating within that local authority area
• provision for local authorities to permit exemptions from the licensing scheme
• details of the penalties which should apply to any non-licensed private parking operator.