Mayor Paul Bristow claims Peterborough City Council is ‘stalling’ his plans for free parking in city centre

Mr Bristow, a Conservative, said the Labour-led Peterborough City Council administration were not interested in his offer for free parking and were “trying to make this about politics”, but leader Cllr Shabina Qayyum insisted this was untrue.

Mr Bristow told the Local Democracy Reporting Service: “I still really want to do this with Peterborough City Council but it seems they don’t want to know. I can only wait for so long. I’ve asked, but they don’t seem to be interested.

“Huntingdonshire have come back with serious proposals. Peterborough City Council have come back with nothing. I’m going to fulfil my promise to deliver free parking. If that means going for a private operator then that is what I’m going to do.”

Mr Bristow said he wanted to make a deal on free parking for Peterborough as soon as possible in order to determine how much money would be set aside for it in the CPCA budget, and confirmed that a figure would become clear towards the end of the year.

Peterborough City Council’s leader Cllr Qayyum wrote a letter to Mr Bristow saying she was “surprised and disappointed” by his remarks and claimed that he had not contacted her once about free parking since she was elected on September 12.

The Labour-led city council administration said discussions between CPCA and council officers had been ongoing for a number of months to determine possibilities around introducing a free parking scheme, which was part of Mr Bristow’s election manifesto.

Cllr Qayyum told the Local Democracy Reporting Service: “Councils use money from car parking to fund services and so any free parking initiative would need to be funded by the mayor.

“Officers have worked up a proposal and provisionally drawn up the costings for it and are due to meet with cabinet members to discuss, so it is not true that we have rejected or stalled his offer of free parking.

“What we need from the mayor is a firm idea of exactly how much he intends to put towards free parking. If he engages with me rather than taking a media-first approach to his job, then maybe we’d be able to get somewhere.”

She asked Mr Bristow to “put an offer on the table” and confirm how much the combined authority was willing to pay.

The city council claimed that for the mayor to introduce free parking in the city centre seven days a week, it would require a funding commitment of £3.4 million.

A spokesperson for the council’s administration said: “We are aware the CPCA is unlikely to be able to commit to this level of funding, so we are working on a proposal for a reduced offer which would require less funding. This proposal will be presented to the CPCA shortly.”

The combined authority shared a correspondence log which showed initial emails and meetings between the CPCA and council throughout May and June, with chaser emails sent to the council in July and a final one on September 8 which received a response from the service director for infrastructure and highways.

A source close to the mayor said: “Despite some initial emails and meetings, our log shows that Peterborough City Council quickly went quiet. The mayor is determined to use every tool at his disposal to bring the city council back to the table should discussions with officers stall.

“If Peterborough City Council were to develop options, and councillors could find the time to consider them, the combined authority and the mayor stand ready to move forward with a free parking offer for Peterborough.”