Battle over £85 parking ticket taken to the Supreme Court

Jul 30, 2015

Written By Sofia Gymer, Editor, AllAboutLaw.co.uk

48-year-old fish and chip shop owner Barry Beavis, who argues that his parking fine was unlawful, has taken his complaint to the Supreme Court in a landmark case.

Beavis was issued the fine in Chelmsford in 2013 by a private parking company, ParkingEye, after staying the car park 56 minutes longer than the maximum 2-hour stay.

Beavis said: "I am confident that the Supreme Court will overturn the decision of the Court of Appeal as this parking charge is totally unfair and should be thrown out." The issue, he claims, is with the unregulated nature of private parking fines.

His case has been overruled by three appeal court judges and was described as "not extravagant or unconscionable".

It’s hard not to be impressed by Beavis tenacity. In order to raise the money to take the case to the Supreme Court, Beavis ran a remarkably successful crowd-funding campaign, which raised over £8,500 in 48 hours - greatly surpassing the necessary £6000.

He said: “I had already secured John de Waal QC pro bono but I needed to crowd-fund to get enough money for the case and filing fees which are quite expensive in the Supreme Court”.

A partner at Harcus Sinclair, which is acting for Beavis, said: “It is a vindication of the English civil justice system that a case involving an individual who has been issued a disproportionate parking penalty charge by a private parking company is being heard by the highest court in the land.”

The outcome of the case is predicted to affect millions of motorists up and down the country, and pave the way for many more challenges against private parking fines if successful. On the other hand, if ParkingEye is successful it will potentially encourage other private parking business to charge more extravagant fines.

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