More lenient parking laws are to be introduced following allegations that local authorities use penalty notices as purely a money-making exercise.

The measures include trialling a 25 per cent discount for motorists who lose an appeal against a parking ticket and the scrapping of fines for motorists who park near broken meters if there is no other obvious place to pay and park.

Neighbours and businesses will also have the right to demand a review of parking in their area, including the use of yellow lines and charges.

And councils which use so-called ‘spy cars’ to catch motoring offenders will be told to stop doing so unless the offence takes place in a bus lane or at a bus stop, or outside a school.

For more on this story see next week's Epping Forest Guardian - out next Thursday.