Councils make record £1.4bn profit on parking charges
Councils make record £1.4bn profit on parking charges
Gareth CorfieldTue, September 29, 2026 at 6:10 PM UTC
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London is home to some of the top councils for parking charge profits - Alamy
Parking charges have brought in a record £1.4bn of annual profit for councils, according to an AA analysis.
The figure, recorded as “surplus income”, rose by more than a fifth in 2025 from the previous year, when it stood at just under £1.2bn.
Conservative-controlled Westminster council made the biggest profit, according to the analysis of government data, bringing in £109m from on-street bay parking.
Standard pay-to-park charges in street bays in the tourist-heavy London borough can range from £1.51 to £10.58 an hour, depending on the location and type of car.
Labour-run Lambeth and the Tories’ Kensington and Chelsea, also both in the capital, were second and third-highest for bay parking profits at £57m and £55m respectively.
Jack Cousens, an AA spokesman, accused local authorities of treating parking as a “cash cow to try to prop up their failing finances”, only to “moan when their expensive parking drives away visitors”.
He encouraged people to park further out where charges are lower and then take the bus to save money, and “force greedy councils to reassess their parking charges”.
Motorists pay the price
Most parking profits made by English councils come from on-street parking bays, typically found on residential roads and outside shops.
Figures published by the Ministry for Housing, Communities and Local Government earlier this month showed councils made £997m from on-street bays alone.
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Across England, local authorities made a further £436m in profits from council-run car parks.
Westminster also topped that league table, having banked more than £15m from its off-street parking.
Earlier this year, London Councils, a lobbying group, said wardens working for its members had also issued 13 per cent more parking tickets in 2025 than in 2024.
The AA analysis suggested a combination of higher parking charges and more penalties had become an increasingly important source of money for councils, despite the Government introducing new taxes.
Wandsworth, which The Telegraph revealed last month was considering England’s biggest ever council tax rise, made £33m profit from on-street parking bays by doubling its rates.
Brighton and Hove council raised its seafront parking charges by as much as 256 per cent from the start of March.
The Telegraph revealed earlier this year that private parking companies were targeting motorists with higher fees too, by using “surge pricing” tactics.
This newspaper also reported last year that there were more parking attendants in Britain than full-time soldiers in the Army.
A Local Government Association spokesman said: “Money raised from fines and charges is used for running parking services, with any surplus spent on essential transport improvements, including fixing the road repairs backlog, reducing congestion, tackling poor air quality and supporting local bus services.”
Source: “AOL Money”
