A Cornwall Council scrutiny committee has agreed to endorse a controversial move to transfer 25 of its free or partially free car parks to a private enforcement company … but with caveats.

In March, the council’s Conservative cabinet endorsed a proposal to decentralise a number of its environment, heritage and other land-based assets, ten percent of which are car parks. It hopes to save £2m by the end of 2026 by doing this.

Following a trial at Towan Headland (Little Fistral) in Newquay, a new model of managing some of the local authority’s car parks has now been considered with a further trial at New Polzeath in place since July. That car park site is leased to the council’s arm’s length company, Corserv Solutions Ltd, and managed by a private enforcement company using Automatic Number Plate Recognition (ANPR). Winter charging has been introduced at the car park with prices set at “very similar rates” to Cornwall Council car parks.

Car parks now being considered to follow the model are classed as not being in strategic locations – for example, sites which help traffic management or would act as a location for a public transport hub.

The council has named 25 car parks as part of the suggested change. They are:

Cllr David Harris, Cabinet member for resources, told a meeting of the council’s economic scrutiny committee this week the move was “very simple”.

“Many, many people get away with not paying for parking and the easiest way is to mirror what’s been done at Towan car park in Newquay where it was leased to Treveth [another arm’s length council company], who then employed a private operator which has run that very successfully. Revenues have gone up and there have been minimal complaints I believe from locals.

“One of the concerns that a number of people have expressed is that by having a private operator people are going to get stung for hundred pound penalties for parking for 30 seconds or whatever. It’s clear that hasn’t happened in Newquay.”

He said the transport department had looked at a number of car parks where a similar model could be rolled out, but run by Corserv rather than Treveth. “The effect of this will be to increase overall revenue, to ensure that people park properly and to allow our enforcement officers to go out in towns and put tickets on people parking on yellow lines,” added Cllr Harris.

Senior council officer Phil Mason said the particular car parks were chosen as the council believed they could be run without any detriment to the local community and could actually benefit local people. He said the transfer of Towan car park brought capital investment, better maintenance and enforcement at no cost to the council.

Cllr Leigh Frost asked, if the move was to shrink Cornwall Council’s estate, why town and parish councils had not been approached to run the car parks “down the proper devolution route” rather than them being run by a third party. Mr Mason said although it was about shrinking its estate, it was also ensuring the council gets the revenue from those assets as it pays for the public transport network, so transferring to parishes and towns would lose that income.

He said the operator would be free to set their fines, but that would be part of a contract with Corserv. The officer added that Corserv did not want to get a reputation for running car parks which are more aggressively run, so would be mindful of their management. “They want to be in a position where they know the enforcement in these car parks is done in an even and fair way, like we do.”

The meeting heard that users of those car parks would have a JustPark “wallet” facility for multi-use payment but only at those car parks and not across Cornwall as was previously available.

Cllr Julian German said there was “something wrong” with the fact the council could transfer car parks rapidly to a company but not to parish and town councils. The meeting had heard that it can take years for assets to be transferred to another council.

The meeting heard there was a two-year break built into the lease, so if the transfer was an “absolute disaster” the way the car parks are managed could be changed.

Cllr John Conway said Launceston has three car parks on the list out of a total of six Cornwall Council car parks. “Launceston Town Council has been asking to purchase the car parks from Cornwall for many years. Launceston is quite upset about what is happening here because we have been saying for years we’d pay a market value for them.”

Cllr Peter Perry said the Rosewarne car park and its extension in Camborne was the only car park in the centre of town and was there to alleviate what would otherwise be an impossible parking situation, so questioned why it was on the list. He was told the car park wasn’t deemed to aid traffic management issues. Cllr Perry vehemently disagreed and said that it shouldn’t be on the list under the criteria set out.

The committee agreed to endorse the disposal of the car parks to Corserv Solutions Ltd but with a number of recommendations attached. These included ensuring that Cornwall Council asks all Cornish MPs to jointly lobby the relevant government minister to authorise the council and other local authorities to use ANPR equipment. Councils are not currently allowed to install ANPR equipment in their own car parks.

Members also voted to ensure Corserv does all it can to include all the car parks in the JustPark wallet system and that Cornwall Council works with Corserv to explore direct deployment of ANPR themselves without the use of a private contractor.

They also agreed that negotiations should take place with whichever enforcement company wins the contract to introduce a “reasonable grace period” before a fine is issued.