Despite the abuse already hurled at them for issuing parking tickets, parking wardens say they are keen to take over some traffic enforcement work from the police.
New Zealand Parking Association chairman Colin Waite said the association planned to lobby the Government for the right to operate speed cameras and issuetickets for driving offences such as not stopping at red lights.
At present, parking wardens can only issue parking tickets and infringements on stationary vehicles.
Mr Waite said he was not concerned that the move could see parking wardens suffer more abuse than they currently did.
The higher skills needed for the new roles meant people would respect parking officers more.
Mr Waite touched on his plans for increasing parking wardens' powers at a national parking conference in Nelson yesterday.
Speaking outside the conference, Mr Waite said the move would free police for more serious work.
"We want to be able to legally direct traffic, hand out fines for smoky vehicles and order unsafe vehicles off the road."
He said parking wardens were also keen to take on the role of recovering unpaid tickets. At present, unpaid parking fines are handed over to the courts for collection if they are unpaid after 56 days.
Mr Waite estimated that 25 per cent of parking tickets were never paid and a further 75 per cent of the more expensive tickets for offences such as unregistered vehicles were never recovered.
This left local authorities with a lot of money owed to them.
Mr Waite cited the example of Waitakere City, which was owed between $7 million and $11 million by the courts.
