> On Tue, 24 Jul 2007 18:20:02 +0100, nightjar wrote
> (in message giganews.com>):
>
>
>

>>> When the council remove an apparently abandoned car, do they simply wait a
>>> week and then crush it, or do they pass the details to the police at some
>>> stage so they (police) can contact the owner? I'm assuming that it was
>>> still identifiable by its number-plates.

>

>> They are under no obligation to try to trace the owner of a vehicle that is
>> classed as abandoned. A notice warning of the removal of the car is attached
>> to it and, if nobody removes it or contacts the Council to say it is not
>> abandoned within a week of when the notice is attached, it is removed.

>

>>> Supposing that it had been stolen and then abandoned: the owner wouldn't
>>> have any way of knowing that the car had been found and crushed.
>>> Presumably the council have to make that assumption to give the owner the
>>> benefit of the doubt.

>

>> Had it been reported stolen, it would have been on a database of stolen
>> vehicles and the Council would have had a duty to contact the owner.

>
> In both cases, this is a stupid law. One of those "there's a problem, what
> can we do quickly" things that was never thought through. So you go off on
> holiday, while you are awy your car is nicked and abandoned, and you come
> back to find it's been crushed by the council. Away for a fortnight, what
> chance do you have of responding to something up to a week before you might
> reasonably know you have something to respond to ?
>
> What about people that work away all week, so have little chance to say
> anything about it. Drive off to work Sun evening, get back Friday evening and
> find car gone, report it to police, council crushes car on Monday morning and
> gets notification from police not to do so on Tuesday or Wednesday.
>
> I suspect that this same law is the one that allows a council to enter onto
> your own private property, remove, and crush what they think is an abandoned
> vehicle - without even bothering to tell you. I know a few people who have
> off-road competition vehicles which to a casual observer could be seen as an
> old beaten up abandoned vehicle - some of them have spent years putting the
> things together (though they usually don't look battered and abandoned until
> they've been used for a bit after that).
>
> I have a friend that had his car stolen by a council in London - it was
> legally parked, but they took it away and painted yellow lines where it had
> been. Fortunately for him, it was noticable because he worked nights (hence
> an unusual parking pattern for that area) and an administrator at the pound
> recognised it and could vouch for the fact that it was legally parked.
>
> This law is bad, and needs serious ammendment - it's just too easy for a
> council to remove and crush a vehicle without the owner having a reasonable
> chance of doing anything about it.