Request ID: FOI-4269-2324 Date published: 12 March 2024
You asked
Can you send me copies of successful appeals against PCN’s outside 163 - 183 New Kent rd Se1 on red route.
Parking contravention 46.
Years 2022 - 2024.
We answered
TfL Ref: FOI-4269-2324
Thank you for your request which we received on 16 February 2024, asking for information about penalty charge notices (PCNs).
Your request has been considered in accordance with the requirements of the Freedom of Information Act and our information access policy. I can confirm that we hold the information you require. You asked:
Can you send me copies of successful appeals against PCN’s outside 163 - 183 New Kent Road Se1 on red route. Parking contravention 46. Years 2022 - 2024.
However, in accordance with the FOI Act, we are not obliged to supply this information as it is subject to a statutory exemption to the right of access to information under section 31 of the FOI Act, which relates to law enforcement. Specifically, we are refusing your request under section 31(1)(b), which relates to information whose disclosure would be likely to prejudice the apprehension or prosecution of offenders, and section 31(1)(g), which relates to information whose disclosure would be likely to prejudice the exercise by any public authority of its functions or any of the purposes listed in subsection 31(2) of the FOI Act. In this case, this is section 31(2)(a) – the purpose of ascertaining whether any person has failed to comply with the law.
In this instance the exemption has been applied as disclosure of the information you have requested would reveal the likelihood of a driver being issued with a parking fine at the location you have asked about. The purpose of enforcement cameras is to assist with the safe and smooth flow of traffic on the TfL road network, and TfL has the power to issue PCNs where drivers contravene a range of restrictions on the network. If drivers are aware of how likely (and, by extension, how unlikely) they are to be issued with a PCN then it would encourage non-compliance with those traffic restrictions in the areas that are not covered or are covered to a lesser extent.
Disclosing information about PCNs by a specific location would reveal the level of enforcement activity carried out at the specific location, which would lead to a decrease in compliance with traffic restrictions at those locations. Disclosure of this information to you has to be regarded as a disclosure to ‘the public at large’.
The use of this exemption is subject to an assessment of the public interest in relation to the disclosure of the information concerned. We recognise the need for openness and transparency by public authorities, but in this instance feel that balance lies in favour of withholding the information to ensure that we are able to manage traffic on the TfL Road Network. It would be strongly against the public interest to release any information that would undermine this.
Please see the attached information sheet for details of your right to appeal.
Yours sincerely
Eva Hextall FOI Case Management Team General Counsel Transport for London
