Untaxed vehicles will soon be removed from the streets of Hastings & St Leonards in 48 hours, following the Council's move to take over powers from the DVLA.
The scheme is expected to start at the end of October and the challenging 48 hour target met by next year This revolutionary new approach is a response to residents' fears about the growing numbers of dumped cars in the town.
Untaxed and unlicensed vehicles cause problems because there is no way of tracing owners and making them carry the cost of removing their vehicle. Authorities also believe that ultimately, untaxed vehicles will end up as abandoned cars. Taking them off the street early could mean less abandoned cars in the future.
The Council, Sussex Police, the Fire Service and the DVLA worked together on the 'Cubit' scheme in March, which ran for four weeks and removed 500 untaxed vehicles from the streets - only 71 were declamped or reclaimed.
Adopting the DVLA powers will ensure that a similar scheme is continuous. The Council will take responsibility for all wheel clamping now that it has adopted these new powers and will also be responsible for the fees involved in clamping, de-clamping (£80 per vehicle), removal, impounding (£160 per vehicle) and storage (£15 per day) of vehicles.
It is anticipated that the Council will remove around 1400 unlicensed vehicles per year. The estimated running costs of the scheme are around £179,900 per year.
The costs will be met by an increase in the Council's car parking charges, which will be implemented in October. For example a weekly season ticket will increase from £10.50 to £12, a Quarterly season ticket will increase from £100 to £120 and a quarterly Restricted Zone ticket in Priory Street will increase from £60 to £75. On street parking will increase to 40p per 30 minutes - its original level before it was dropped shortly after the scheme began in 1999.
Councillor Paul Silverson, Cabinet Member responsible for Transport, said:
"We've been pushing the DVLA to take over their powers to allow us to remove abandoned, dumped and untaxed cars for some time. The Cubit scheme, which we ran in conjunction with the police, fire service and DVLA in March this year was a real success and received support from organisations and residents across the town.
"Taking over these powers will not just benefit our town in the short-term. Taking these dangerous vehicles off the streets will give us long-term benefits too.
"Our abandoned vehicles team are under increasing pressure to visit and later remove vehicles from the streets - during 2001 we took 1,166 at a cost of £30 per car - a total of £34,980 last year alone. This of course is entirely funded by council taxpayers.
"Our Pay & Display off-street parking charges have remained the same since December 1998 and on-street since 1999 Sand will still be good value in comparison to other car parks in the town. A small increase in car park charges will fully fund this scheme without making more demands on taxpayers. We fully intend to rid the streets of abandoned and untaxed vehicles more quickly and also take away some of the vehicles which Sussex Police believe are pool cars, used for criminal activity.
"I am delighted that there will be so many positive spin-offs from this project."
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This page last updated: 17/10/2002