Ministry starts blitz on decades-old parking fines

The Justice Ministry is chasing up thousands of decades-old parking tickets in a bid to claw back millions of dollars in overdue fines.

The ministry confirmed this week that Collections Unit staff were chasing up 2761 overdue parking fines dating back 20 years.

Unpaid parking fines at the end of March totalled $28 million. This includes $19 million in overdue fines.

About $300,000 was owed on parking fines older than 15 years, with $111 (including enforcement fees and court costs) the average amount owed.

The news comes a month after Upper Hutt man Nathan Bentley had $73,000 in traffic fines wiped by a district court judge and three months after Hamilton judge Anne McAloon let Aaron Pace off paying a $31,352 debt for traffic offences.

Ministry spokeswoman Candice McLachlan said the blitz - which has seen one Paraparaumu woman paying for a nine-year-old ticket she says she never received - was part of a continuing campaign aimed at hauling in about $580 million of unpaid fines.

No time limit applied to collecting fines.

"Fines don't go away. They are a justice sanction aimed at deterring unacceptable behaviour and are never remitted for reasons of age of the fine or expediency."

That message was made clear to Paraparaumu woman Robyn Gray recently when she received a letter threatening action if she did not pay "outstanding fines" of $115 within seven days.

The ticket is one of almost 44,000 that Wellington City Council - owed $2.8 million in overdue parking fines - has lodged with the Collections Unit.

"My heart just fell to my feet. I thought 'what the hell is this for?'," Ms Gray said.

A call to the ministry established the unpaid fines related to a ticket issued in December 1996 while her car was parked outside a Wellington garage waiting to be serviced.

"Of course I paid it [the outstanding fine]," Ms Gray said.

"But it's just bizarre. You would have thought I would have had something before now.

"Why weren't they chasing it up before, over the last nine years?"

Ms McLachlan said people in Ms Gray's situation, where the original infringement notice was not received, could ask the court to remedy the situation under a procedure known as an application to correct an irregularity.

Courts wiped $40 million in fines in 2004.

- NZPA