Campaigners told a cut in Tewkesbury parking charges will be considered

A CALL for parking charges to be slashed in half in Tewkesbury will be considered by the council.

A petition calling for the change was handed to the borough council. It was signed by 6,000 people and backed by businesses, councillors and the chamber of commerce.

Borough bosses said they would consider the proposal, but not until April.

The delay is because of a review being carried out into off-street parking.

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Vernon Smith (C, Newtown) launched the campaign in January and handed the petition over to a meeting of Tewkesbury Borough Council's executive.

The town, borough and county councillor had hoped a change would be in place in time for Christmas.

He said: "I'm very pleased the council is taking the petition seriously, but I'm very disappointed it will take so long."

The campaign is backed by a business plan which aims to demonstrate that the cut would not affect council funds.

Mr Smith said the council makes £600,00 from parking a year and the £300,000 lost revenue could be made up by applying to retain more of the areas business rates.

The borough collects £33m in rates a year on behalf of Whitehall and gets back £3.5m.

Mr Smith said: "This is not a pie in the sky idea and we have put a lot of hard work into it. Gloucester City cut its prices and I've been told its revenue hasn't dropped.

"If Tewkesbury goes ahead it might actually gain money because more people will stay longer in the car parks."

Mr Smith thanked the campaign supporters, who included borough councillor Adele-Louise Carter, town councillors Kevin Cromwell and Karen Brennan, MP Laurence Robertson and Shelby Powell from Tewkesbury Chamber of Commerce and Industry.

Tewkesbury Borough Council's lead member for economic development and promotion Councillor Dave Waters said: "We're grateful for the interest in this issue. We will factor the issues raised into our parking strategy, which we will start working on in April.

"The reason we're not looking at it before is we're carrying out a review of our off-street parking, including the potential to outsource it, as a result of the county council's wider review of on-street parking."