Introduction

Transport Scotland has undertaken an analysis of the responses to the public consultation on Penalty Charge Notices (PCNs) for parking enforcement which was published on 24 October 2025. It sought views from stakeholders and interested parties on the levels of charges and whether this level should change.

Background

Since 1997, 23 local authorities in Scotland have introduced decriminalised parking enforcement (DPE) regimes into their areas. These regimes enable local authorities to administer their own parking penalty charge schemes to encourage compliance with on-street parking controls.

Parking policies are an essential part of a local authority’s traffic management strategy as they are designed to effectively manage the traffic network, improve and maintain traffic flows whilst reducing congestion.

The integration of enforcement powers and parking policy enhances a local authority’s accountability to its residents, through better monitoring of the effectiveness of the parking controls in place to ensure that their parking policy is responsive to public needs.

For enforcement to be effective, penalty charges for parking infringements need to be set at an appropriate level. Following on from a rise in the maximum level of charge in 2023, we committed to a further review in the coming years.

The Consultation

The consultation was designed to gather the views of stakeholders and individuals on the levels of penalty charges and whether the levels should change.

Three questions were posed in total. The questions focused solely on the levels for PCNs.

The consultation period ran from 24 October 2025 to 30 January 2026 and was published on both Transport Scotland’s website: Penalty Charge Notice (PCN) Levels for Decriminalised Parking Enforcement | Transport Scotland and the Scottish Government’s Citizen Space website: Penalty Charge Notice (PCN) Levels for Decriminalised Parking Enforcement - Scottish Government consultations - Citizen Space. Interested parties could submit responses online, by email or by post.

Overview of Responses

The final number of responses received was 101. Of these, 8 were submitted by local authorities, 17 from organisations, and 76 were listed as individuals.

Figure 1: Responses by type, as described in following text
Figure 1: Responses by type

Analysis of Responses

The consultation was hosted on Citizen Space opening on 24 October 2025 and closing on 30 January 2026. Responses could be submitted directly from the Citizen Space website, via email and post. Some 101 responses were received via Citizen Space. No responses were received via post.

Respondents were not required to answer every question and typically answered the questions that interested them or they felt informed to answer. As such the total number of respondents varies for each question.

Of the 101 responses, 26 (26%) were happy for their responses to be published. A further 58 (57%), were happy for their responses to be published, but did not want their name and/or organisation to be attributed to the response. Where this is the case these responses have been included in the overall analysis but the response has been anonymised prior to being published by Transport Scotland. Any comments or quotes made within this report have been included in a way which maintains their anonymity. 17 respondents (17%) did not give permission for their responses to be published.