COUNCIL parking attendants could soon have the power to fine motorists who misuse disabled parking badges after it was discovered that drivers are abusing the system.

A report produced for City of York Council's Disabled Persons' Advisory Group found that rules governing the use of blue disabled parking badges are "widely misunderstood".

It is a criminal offence for non-disabled people to use a blue badge and can result in a fine of up to £1,000.

At present, only police may take legal action against such abuse, but the Government is currently reviewing the possibility of also allowing council parking attendants to hand out penalty notices.

The only sanction available to the council at the moment is to withdraw the badge if misuse occurs, but this could have a serious effect on the life of the disabled badge holder.

A total of 770 penalty charge notices were issued last year in York to vehicles parked in disabled bays without displaying a disabled person's blue badge.

Of these, 472 were issued in car parks and the remaining 298 in on-street bays.

Parking services manager, Russ Broadbent, states in the report: "The scale of the problem will be more serious than this because there will, inevitably, be many other motorists who have parked in designated disabled bays, but not been seen by a parking attendant and, hence, will not have been issued with a penalty charge notice."

The council will also want to remove confusion surrounding the restrictions on use of disabled badges.

The report states: "It is clear from the letters that the Parking Services Section has received from disabled badge holders when they have received penalty charge notices for contravening the regulations, that there is a lack of understanding among badge holders of where they are allowed to park and where they cannot do so."

Restrictions include pedestrianised areas, bus or cycle lanes and bay reserved for specific users such as taxis.

The proposals will be discussed by the Disabled Persons' Advisory Group on Wednesday, April 27, at 7pm.

Updated: 08:25 Friday, April 16, 2004