The dust has settled.

So time has passed and all the court appearances have finished. I have been found guilty of causing damage to an ISTM clampers van. The judge was fair in his summing up and expressed that no matter how bad I thought I was treated that day, he cannot advocate people of any age, picking up hammers and taking the law into their own hands. This I duly accept. Also he handed down the minimum fine that he could under law and rejected ISTM Groups claim for personal damages. Again I thank him for this.

I also would like to thank Jennie Bond for highlighting my story on her documentary Driving me Crazy that aired last year. It was interesting to watch Jennie tell the boss of ISTM that I was treated unfairly in my predicament. I did not hear one word of compassion from ISTM management. At the end of the day to them the rules are the rules and that’s it. (Even when faced with a confused 81 yearold great gran mother in a nightdress at 8.30 on a cold Monday morning).

I’m glad I blogged what happened to me to show that I was not just a mad enraged women. Yes I was naive to car clamping (as I stated earlier in my blogs I had the same parking bay for 25 years previous to the clamping so was just unaware of it all). After what I did, it opened up a can of worms. The amount of people that came forward and told me about the unfair way they were treated by ISTM astonished me. At 81 years of age and failing health I could not let this rest. I took my parking concerns fairly to the residents meetings and gained my fellow residents support via a petition. I personally took to the streets of my home town Bethnal Green (Where I have lived since arriving in this country back in 1959). In two afternoons I gained over 150 signatures with only 1 person giving negative feedback. I left my grandson Nicholas to do the leg work of gaining signatures in my blocks of flats. The result was overwhelming. 99% of people we approached said the rules were unfair and many people on my estate had been personally affected by ISTM clampers not following the rules or were clamped because the rules were not clear.

Below is the reply to my petition that I handed in to the residents meeting back in Nov06 and what I think about it.

5. Petition to Bethnal Green ARB
5.1 On 15th November2006 a petition was presented to Bethnal Green ARB asking for a change to the THCH parking control policy. This petition was signed by 25 persons, 23 of whom are THCH residents. All THCH resident petitioners are from the Mansford Estate. The petition asked that the policy be changed to allow a period of grace for those whose tax discs had expired and argued that THCH residents should not be subject to parking control enforcement. The petitioners received broad support from the Bethnal Green ARB however it is not recommended that the policy on tax discs be changed. Service Delivery Committee has considered this matter in both February and May 2006 and not chosen to amend the policy. The intent of the policy is two-fold: firstly to ensure consistency with the DVLA so that our residents are clear on what the rules are and secondly because requiring our residents to have up to date tax discs offers THCH assurance that cars parked on our land are both roadworthy (MOT) and insured.

So there you have it. I actually gained broad support from the ARB (Area Residents Board) with regards to my proposals. They could have done more (I.e. allowed at least a 2 weeks grace period when our Tax Disc run out to renew) I did not pursue this further as at this point I felt I had done enough to highlight this cause. As blogged eariler though we did get the rules changed so that ISTM had to follow the 10mins grace rule.

Last year they was a major development with regards to ISTM managing the parking on our estates. It was reported in the East London advertiser that the ISTM group was not going to have their contract renewed at the end of Dec 2007. This was due to the volume of complaints they received from THCH residents. This has not happened yet due to THCH finding it difficult to find a parking control company that will work 24hs. Also from what I understand ISTM changed their management structure back in summer 2007. The new management apparently have given better training to their clamping operatives that patrol our estates. My message to any ISTM clamper who patrols our estates is always be lenient to delivery drivers who come into our block. Most times they cant find a free bay so do give them extra time as they are here to serve our community.

To sum up and send a message to everyone who has followed this story I would like to say this. If you are unhappy about any way that you are being treated by councils, associations, public body’s ect.. do try and get your voice heard. Speak to people, gain a consensus and do go to meetings or complain and write letters. Sometimes the very people we vote in to represent us get complacent and think its their god given right to do the job they do. And over time they think they are right in dictating to us what we can and cannot do. No... they are there to listen to and action our concerns. Don’t let them forget it.

Guilty?

I have been found guilty by the Thames magistrate court of causing criminal damage to a clampers van. I will post my views on this, this weekend after I have had a chance to rest.

ISTM - A small victory for everyone...

Well they say Rome was not built in a day and its definitely true for the THCH! Below is the Service Delivery Committee`s new arrangements for the implementation of the Parking Control policy. In it they even give a response to my petition that was handed in back in November. 06 (I actually had a personal response to my petition and I will reply to this soon).

I must say congratulations to David Eatwell for implementing the new 10 Min's grace policy as hi lighted in Red in the statment policy down below. (I actually think this should be 15 Min's. Check my updated website next week for more info). Now some of the less unscrupulous ISTM operatives cannot hide in bushes or duck behind cars and clamp us while our backs our turned. Indeed they now have to photograph our cars first and come back after 10 Min's to clamp, if a parking ticket / permit not displayed after this time. Since this has been introduced I have personally not heard of any one being clamped in this estate. Now our family and friends can breathe a bit.

I'm also glad this has happened as its a victory for another 81 year old lady who lives on my estate. Upon signing my petition back in November 06, she requested we hi light this 10 Min`s rule at the next meeting, as one of her family was clamped as they came to pick her up. They were only in the ground floor flat a few minutes before they were clamped. ISTM were paid the release fee but this was a kick in the teeth and had ruined her day.

In the meeting I only spoke about this rule briefly before other people started agreeing with me and criticizing THCH for this non observed policy that was causing utmost misery to us East Enders. This alongside other people who have complained, made the THCH rethink their policy.

Its only a small victory but like I said before, Rome was not built in a day....


Report to: THCH Service Delivery Committee
8th February 2007
Report by: David Eatwell - Director of Housing
Subject: Parking Control - Briefing Paper
1. Summary
1.1. This report is to inform Service Delivery Committee of the new arrangements for the implementation of the Parking Control policy

2. Recommendations
2.1 That Service Delivery Committee notes the report

3. Background
THCH appointed IS Traffic Management to provide our parking control enforcement service in 2005. A contract was signed for an initial pilot period from July to September 2005 with an extension for 12 months to September 2006.
The contract signed was provided by IS Traffic Management and did not include a detailed specification of the service to be provided and included at least one clause considered to be particularly onerous upon THCH.
In June 2006 the Director of Housing commenced negotiations on the terms of a new contract addressing these concerns.
In July 2006 these negotiations expanded to include Poplar HARCA and East end Homes
as it was felt that a consortium agreement between the landlords and ISTM Group Ltd (previously IS Traffic Management) would offer both cost savings and improved management of the service. Toynbee Island Homes have subsequently indicated that they also wish to consider joining the agreement. THCH and ISTM Group signed the new agreement on 14th December 2006. It is anticipated that the other landlords will sign early in the new year.

4. The Consortium Agreement
The new agreement incorporates provisions on how the parking control service will be managed by a Management Group made up of senior officers from each of the landlord parties and the Contract Manager from ISTM Group. The Management Group will meet monthly and receive performance reports, consider service improvements and agree any variations to the service specification. The new agreement brings a new financial arrangement for the service. Originally THCH paid a fee to ISTM of £10 per week per location as well as paying for the provision of parking permits to residents at a rate of £10 ea. The new arrangements are that THCH will now only pay a reduced rate for the provision of permits to residents at a rate of £5 per permit holder. This offers a considerable saving to THCH.
4.3- The agreement also includes provisions which prevent ISTM Group from increasing the enforcement charges without the agreement of the Management Group and ties those charges to below the recommended maximum fee in the British Parking Association Code of Practice.The agreement is now more specific on the respective obligations of the parties to provide public liability insurance.The agreement allows other landlords to join the agreement with the approval of the Management Group and is also more balanced in allowing for the termination of the whole agreement or for parties to withdraw from the agreement. The agreement includes a detailed service specification that can be varied to fit the respective policies of landlord parties to the agreement, for example Public Service Permits are not valid on THCH estates but are permitted by Poplar HARCA and East end Homes.

The agreement includes a requirement that timed and dated photographs are taken at the time a parking offence is first observed and then again at least ten minutes later. This observation period is included to allow visitors time to contact the resident and arrange for a visitors permit or dispensation. THCH has a 10-minute observation period where other landlords have agreed 20minutes. This is because of the proximity of THCH estates to shopping areas where short-term casual unauthorised parking has proven to be a problem in the past.

The agreement allows for the Management Group to agree a new protocol for appeals. ISTM and THCH have agreed that a residents' representative can form part of an appeals panel and it is anticipated that this will be implemented once other landlords have formally signed the agreement. It is intended that JARB will be asked to appoint this representative. It is intended to put in place new arrangements for contractor vehicles who currently have to frequently contact THCH offices to refresh their permits. The agreement includes new provisions for dispute resolution although the intent of the agreement itself is to create a framework where disputes are resolved through discussion at an early stage.

5. Petition to Bethnal Green ARB
5.1 On 15th November2006 a petition was presented to Bethnal Green ARB asking for a change to the THCH parking control policy. This petition was signed by 25 persons, 23 of whom are THCH residents. All THCH resident petitioners are from the Mansford Estate.The petition asked that the policy be changed to allow a period of grace for those whose tax discs had expired and argued that THCH residents should not be subject to parking control enforcement. The petitioners received broad support from the Bethnal Green ARB however it is not recommended that the policy on tax discs be changed. Service Delivery Committee has considered this matter in both February and May 2006 and not chosen to amend the policy. The intent of the policy is two-fold: firstly to ensure consistency with the DVLA so that our residents are clear on what the rules are and secondly because requiring our residents to have up to date tax discs offers THCH assurance that cars parked on our land are both road worthy (MOT) and insured.

(Its amazing the amount of information that is available if you request it. Its a shame I was not aware of any of this when they introduced clamping.)

Case adjourned

Unfortunately my case did not get heard yesterday. The case was listed for 2pm but gone 3pm I was instructed that the judge had fallen ill and would not be dealing with my case. I wish the Judge a speedy recovery. My case has now been put back to Friday May the 18th and moved to the Thames Magistrates' Court, 58 bow road London E3 4DJ.

More on this on Monday….

I plead Not Guilty..

I have been summoned to appear in court to answer the charges with relation to causing alledged criminal damage to a ISTM clampers van. This will take place at the Stratford Magistrates court on March 07 at 2pm. (Stratford E15) I will be pleading not guilty to the charges. I will give more information on this after the court case.

Excuse me for not regularly updating my website and blogs. I requested my website to highlight how unfair clamping is. Since I been in the papers people recognise me and ask if im the Hammergran. I speak to people and some tell me stories of how they been clamped not just on estates but even on the streets.
I believe clamping is even more unfair due to the waste of time it causes everyone. People tell me how their cars are taken and they think its been stolen. They ring the police who then inform them it may me the clampers. Of course after this people have to ring around numerous times to find out about their vehicle. I believe a simple fair ticket will suffice instead of all the disruption this causes.

I would like to thank everyone who has showed their support and who have wished me luck and I am looking forward to this being resolved.

This petition is laughable!

Well the title says it all. We were actually told this as we handed over our petition. We did end up getting our petition recognised and our now waiting for the reply. More on this in a bit…

I had waited to attend this residents meeting all week. I had so much to say about the way I was treated and the way my fellow residents felt. So myself, my grandson Nicky and granddaughter Louisa attended the residents meeting on the 15/11/06. My fellow residents wished me good luck and off we went. When we arrived at the meeting, parking was on the agenda and thankfully was near the top of the list. We sat down in the front row and waited for the parking issues to be discussed.

Finally it was nearly our turn. As the THCH parking rules was about to be discussed, the Anne (The THCH chairlady) turned to me and said, “You’re here to discuss the parking aren’t you? I had never seen this lady before but she definitely had heard about me. She gave a short description of the current status of the car parking rules and asked people for their opinions.

We were the first to speak and with this my Grandson (who takes up the story) stated, “Your car parking rules got my Nan clamped amd this caused her misery and distress. I explained that this was unnecessary as she was parked on THCH private land, displaying a valid parking permit. I went on to explain that there was no need for this and that the clamping of residents should stop. We were told that no clampers would operate without clamping and that clamping has cleaned our estates of abandoned cars. I highlighted that this does keep out outsiders but asked them what was the need for my Nan to be clamped while she was showing a valid parking permit? We was told that these are the rules but the THCH was discussing imposing a 2 week grace period on their land, for vehicles who’s Tax Disc had ran out. I made a point that my Nan was governed by the DVLA and did not need to be clamped by her housing association as well. I explained that sending out reminder notices instead of clamping was fairer to the community.


With this my Gran spoke and highlighted that there was also other problems. She informed the chair people that their car management company (ISTM) was over zealous in applying clamps. As soon a clamper arrives into a resident’s car park they clamp the car in the visitors bays strait away. This had caused problems when visitors had gone into people’s houses to pick up a visitors scratch card. The chair lady stated that ISTM must give 10 mins grace for people not showing a valid permit. When she said this the guy next to me started ranting that this was a load of rubbish. He had problems like us with these clampers and stated that they were taking away family cars. He said he had never seen a clamper wait 10mins and that all the clampers want is money. He started ranting and complaining so much that the chair people requested he calm down or leave. This subject was certainly causing a storm!

Another this we highlighted was that we believed their should be no clamping anyway because the residents were not properly consulted with regards to the car parking rules when the THCH took over. That was because the people we had spoke to, who had attended previous THCH meetings, had not heard of the clamping of residents being talked about specifically. To substantiate this claim we had previously requested all the THCH minutes of meetings upon handover to themselves from the old council. None of their documentation showed anything about parking being discussed with the residents and I told them this. We was informed that reminder leaflets had been delivered to all residents informing of clamping but this did not answer our question. Again we asked where was the discussions about parking and clamping of residents themselfs? A fellow resident who had attended previous residents meetings, stuck up for me and stated that I had a point and that parking had not been discussed. The chair people said nothing and we stated that we want a proper discussion with the clamping of residents being stopped.


Back to our agenda and I asked the chair people what we had to do to get the rules changed. Anne said rather smugly that, as a lone voice there was not a lot.
With this I pulled our petition and explained, “no actually we are not a lone voice as we have started a petition. We handed over our petition but this was rejected and held up in the air as laughable. This happened because we only had 2 THCH residents’ signatures out of the 150 who had signed. Well my Nan and me were gob smacked. I told them that my 81-year-old Gran “had taken to the streets to find out peoples feelings on a subject that was causing misery and distress. That was not laughable.” Opon handing over my petition I had explained that I had knocked on 25 THCH residents doors but I had accidentally had left these in my folder. I then took them out and explained that I actually had many signatures from THCH residents. I handed them over explaining that of the 26 residents I had spoken to, 25 had signed the petition. I explained that this petition showed that most people agreed that the rules needed changing.

I handed the petition to Anne and a second chairlady accepted this petition and explained that it would be forwarded to David Eatwell within THCH who was dealing with parking. She then gave me reassurances that our petition would get a personal reply from David Eatwell himself. With this Anne wanted to continue with the rest of the meeting. I said thanks and that “We will not stop until the clamping is stopped”

So all in all not a bad battle! We went in there to get our voices heard and got our point across. We showed that with the backing of the people we want these car parking rules changed. This needs to happen as these clampers are causing untold misery and distress within our East End community. If it not us residents being clamped, its our family and friends. IS Traffic management have been told to give 10mins grace before they clamp in a visitors bay. They never seem to observe this and as happened with me, are rude as well. I am an 81-year-old great grandmother but I will keep fighting this until this madness and harassment stops.

We will wait now for the response from David Eatwell of the THCH. In the meanwhile I will not be resting, I will be out there gaining more support.
Check back to find out what his reply was to our petition

(Please send replys, comments to Theodora_loizou@hotmail.co.uk)


(Petition Text below)

DEAR THCH, A PETITION FOR CHANGE

I am signing this petition because I am unhappy with your car parking rules & enforcement procedure and want it changed. We would like to see the rules changed and residents of THCH not to be clamped or fined at all when parked on THCH land. A fairer policy should be adopted with regards to helping vulnerable or sick people in our community who are most affected by your clampers.


Name……………………………… Adress…………………………………………………
Name………………………………...Adress…………………………………………………

Petition for change.

Theodora Loizou thanks you for logging into and subscribing to this blog. (Check my website www.hammergran.co.uk to find out what this blog is about) Here I will detail the processes that I am going through to get the current parking rules changed. We want the clamping of THCH residents who are parked in thier own bays - stopped! My parking permit was valid but I was clamped in my own bay, for having an out of date tax disc (less than 36hrs after expirey) that was on private THCH land.

I requested my grandson Nicky, to mount a Petition, asking fellow residents in my block to sign if they agreed that these rules were unjust. Of the 26 that he managed to speak to, 25 signed! I myself personally took to the streets and asked people in my borough what they thought. Again everyone agreed that the parking rules were unfair and signed my petition. I had over 150 signatures in one afternoon with nearly everyone signing!

Our aim is stop our housing association (the THCH) from clamping its own residents.
Our petition calls for this type of clamping to be stopped and reminders sent out instead. This helps sick or vulnerable people in our community. Me and my grandson will be forwarding this Petition to the THCH housing association in a complaints letter and will also be presenting it at the next THCH residents meeting on the 15th Nov.

Keep checking back to follow my progress on getting the parking rules changed...

(For a personal reply, please contact theodora_loizou@hotmail.co.uk )