LEADER of Ealing Council Cllr Jason Stacey has slammed the previous Labour administration for offering incentives to traffic wardens to issue more tickets.

Under the former leadership, wardens received bonuses for hitting motorists with tickets, without any penalties for issuing wrong tickets.

The deal between the council and the Labour group has never been made public before, but the information has come to light following the Ealing Times' report last week stating the current leadership was replacing the contractors and reviewing operating procedures.

Cllr Stacey said he was shocked to discover how bad the previous administration's contract was.

He said: "They managed to clobber the motorist by encouraging excessive issuing of parking tickets, while simultaneously delivering bad value for council taxpayers in terms of costs.

"It really was an appalling contract and is symptomatic of Labour's incompetence in dealing with outside companies.

"The new contract holds the contractor to account and pays them according to performance across a series of indicators including the fairness of tickets."

Under the last deal the former Labour administration - with leader Leo Thomson at the helm - paid contractor Vinci Park Ltd £4.69 per ticket up to 170,000 tickets and £9.79 for each PCN above 170,000.

This offered a huge financial incentive for the contractor to issue as many tickets as possible and yet there were no penalties for issuing false tickets.

But Cllr Bassam Mafouz disputed the Tories' claims, saying wardens were "never given bonuses".

"They are just trying to deflect our concerns over the new contract by dragging up details of one that is five years old," he said.

"The half a million pounds they say in their report they will give to the contractors in bonuses simply for doing a good job should rather be spent on other services."

The new contract with APCOA states wardens can be punished for giving out too many incorrect tickets.

Cllr Stacey said: "One of the biggest complaints we get is about over-zealous traffic wardens. We will punish them based on the number of tickets they get wrong.

"We are taking the emphasis away from them slapping the ticket on and hoping for the best.

"What we want is tickets that are issued correctly."