High Court upholds Clevedon parking charges despite consultation error in Adams v North Somerset Council

The High Court has dismissed a challenge to a traffic regulation order introducing parking charges at three car parks in Clevedon, finding that an admitted failure by North Somerset Council to consider a local business owner's objections did not cause him sufficient prejudice to justify quashing the order.

In Daniel Adams v North Somerset Council [2026] EWHC 1883 (Admin), Mrs Justice Steyn first resolved a preliminary dispute over the correct procedural route for the challenge, holding that because the order had been made partly under section 32 of the Road Traffic Regulation Act 1984, a provision falling within Part VI of Schedule 9 to the Act, the claim was properly brought as a statutory review rather than judicial review. She rejected the council's argument that only its exercise of the separate charging power under section 35 was relevant, noting that a claimant should be able to determine the correct route of challenge from the face of the order itself.

Mr Adams, who manages a stationery business in Clevedon and represented himself, raised seven grounds of challenge, including that the charges were introduced for the improper purpose of raising general revenue rather than funding car park maintenance, that the council had failed to comply with the general duty under section 122 of the 1984 Act, and that the statutory consultation process was unlawful. On the improper purpose ground, drawing on R (Attfield) v London Borough of Barnet, the judge accepted that the 1984 Act is not a taxing statute and that charges could not lawfully be introduced with a dominant purpose of generating surplus revenue for unrelated council spending. She found, however, that the contemporaneous evidence, including committee reports and public statements by councillors, showed the council's dominant purpose was to make the car parks self-financing in the face of chronic underinvestment, a proper purpose under the legislation.

The most significant part of the judgement addressed whether the statutory notice and objection procedure under the Local Authorities' Traffic Orders (Procedure) (England and Wales) Regulations 1996 amounted to consultation in the sense established in R (Moseley) v Haringey London Borough Council and the Gunning principles. The judge held that it did not. Distinguishing the statutory duty to consult specified bodies, such as the police, from the separate publication and objection procedure available to the public, she found that the 1996 Regulations contemplate the authority having already reached an in-principle decision before the formal notice stage, meaning the claimant's argument that the process began too late in the decision-making timeline could not succeed. She also rejected criticisms concerning the accessibility of supporting documents on the council's website and dismissed separate grounds relating to displacement of parked vehicles, the public sector equality duty, and alignment with the council's local plan.

The council did, however, concede that an administrative error had meant two objections submitted by Mr Adams on behalf of a local business group were mistakenly filed against a related on-street order and never considered before the parking order was sealed, in breach of regulation 13 of the 1996 Regulations. Applying the statutory test under paragraph 36 of Schedule 9, which requires a claimant to show substantial prejudice before an order can be quashed for such a breach, the judge concluded that Mr Adams had not met that threshold. She accepted evidence from the council that its officers would have recommended implementing the order without modification even had the objections been properly considered, and found the earlier non-statutory consultation had already given him a meaningful opportunity to influence the proposals. The order was accordingly upheld in full.