Former parking warden says he warned of scam

A former Wellington city parking warden says authorities were made aware more than a year ago of an alleged ticketing scam that has seen almost half of the capital's wardens suspended.

Nine Wellington parking wardens were pulled off the job on Wednesday amid claims they were not ticketing each other's illegally parked cars. The council said it had discovered the "upsetting practice" last week during regular compliance monitoring.

But Stephen Falloon, who worked for Parkwise -- which is contracted to the city council through Armourguard -- for 10 months last year, says he warned Parkwise, Armourguard and the council about the scam as early as June last year.

He had encountered "the dishonesty" on his first day, being told by the supervisor who trained him not to ticket other wardens' cars as he would be "unpopular".

"They (council and Parkwise) were well aware of it...But they were just blind to the whole thing."

Intimidation and threats from colleagues when he did ticket their cars was "ongoing", forcing him to take a month's stress leave and eventually to resign.

"There was a concerted effort (by others) that those of us who would ticket a warden's car would be singled out for abuse."

Several wardens regularly cancelled tickets they received for parking illegally. Mr Falloon claims he was assaulted by a friend of another parking warden after ticketing his car displaying a note from the warden not to ticket it.

After a complaint in June about the incident the warden was warned, but no other action was taken, Mr Falloon said. An Armourguard manager had "assured" him something would be done, he said.

"I thought they would have got everyone in and explained that it was definitely illegal, definitely wrong and it would jeopardise our contract with the council.

"But they didn't. It just went on and on."

In a letter to council parking manager Wayne Tacon in December, Mr Falloon listed names of three wardens he claims were involved. The three are understood to be among the nine suspended last week.

A reply from Mr Tacon notes that Armourguard warned staff that such illegal behaviour could lead to dismissal. A report on the matter is expected in the next few days.

- nzpa