The recent TransportXtra article that contained a copy of the Westminster City Council press release now has a comment beneath it. The comment did not come from me.
DISCLAIMER: The comment contained below simply quotes the comment that has been made by someone beneath the article referred to above.
Any close observer of the Westminster cases here reported and having experience of the many irregularities of PATAS will recognise that this report is a fair summary of the PATAS appeal decisions quoted, but will know that it is a grossly one-sided exaggeration of the CCTV parking enforcement situation in Westminster and shows the intention of PATAS to whitewash over the situation they intend not to disturb.
A substantial objective of this partly-contrived decision was inappropriately and petulantly to denigrate one of the appeal representatives Mr Wise who had the nerve to criticise the erratic decisions of some adjudicators. PATAS appeal decisions show that a given adjudicator has decided differently from one day to the next on the same facts and one adjudicator refuses an appeal but another one allows an appeal on exactly the same facts. Appealing at PATAS is proven to be a lottery.
These adjudicators’ tut tutting about ambushing the poor old councils with evidence on the day is reprehensible. Councils routinely and scandalously decide not to contest appeals at the last minute when they discover beforehand the damning evidence against them presented at an appeal. This doesn’t concern PATAS in the least – just keep the appeals machine running regardless of extensive council wrongdoings that are of no interest to them.
It’s also impertinent for these adjudicators to pontificate arrogantly about appellants ‘ambushing’ councils with late evidence when they allow councils to do exactly the same thing and even adjudicate on evidence not even seen by an appellant until after conclusion of an appeal. An adjudicator Pot calling the Kettle black.
As to ‘unprofessional’ language that so distressed these sensitive adjudicators it is noticeable first that they made no such reprimand of the Council’s barrister representative who made reprehensible unfounded and knowingly-incorrect derogatory statements about the appellants’ representatives (musn’t upset the Council). Their concern for precision in language didn’t inhibit them from their own grossly inappropriate and inaccurate criticism of an expert witness who had proved part of the Council’s case defective.
There again it didn’t concern these laughingly-called independent adjudicators from allowing Westminster Council to have secret access to the tribunal’s computer system before the appeal to help them make their faulty CCTV evidence operate (this being what the appeals were all about), nor did they find against this Council when their defective CCTV evidence repeatedly failed to operate during the appeal hearing! Never mind the facts, let’s get on to the decision.
There was nothing “ill-informed” about the appellants’ case as the adjudicators stated and, far from their gratuitous nonsense about “damaging the interests of motorist”, it is the tireless activity of Mr Segal and Wise in this matter that has caused scores or even hundreds of wrongly-penalised motorists to have their appeals against Westminster allowed. Neither PATAS nor the Council will tell you that because it would spoil a good story.
Best not to believe everything you read, especially when it comes from an official source
