I was outside London Waterloo railway station and was looking for a bin to dispose of an empty coffee cup. The only bin I could see was completely full, but there was a plastic bag containing rubbish at the base. I put my cup in that bag and was stopped by an enforcement officer, who had been standing at a distance watching the bin. He told me I had violated the law and refused my offer to remove my cup.
After printing out a penalty notice, he remained in the same spot watching the overflowing bin. It seemed like a set-up. I discovered I had been fined £500, payable within 28 days and reduced to £325 if paid within 14 days. There is no right of appeal, and failure to pay could result in prosecution and a £2,500 penalty. Can you advise me?
The chances of him (or her, the article doesn’t make it clear) being anything else are so infinitesimal as to be invisible to the naked eye.
And the 'Guardian' duly looks into the case:I asked Lambeth council why people who were evidently unaware they were committing an offence were not given warnings instead of fines. It said that to be “consistent and fair,” it fined everyone, and it justified imposing the highest allowable penalty as a deterrent. The south London council reportedly issued the second-highest number of fines for littering over a 12-month period. It outsources its enforcement to the parking company APCOA but says the company does not keep any of the revenue raised or receive incentives to issue tickets. It refused to cancel your fine. If you challenge it in court, you lose the early payment discount. So my advice to you is to pay up through gritted teeth and stick to official bins in future.
Of course that’s the advice. But what a lot of words to say ‘just pay up sucker, it’s an unfair world but we should just accept it because ‘fairness’ is a white supremacist concept!’















