DRIVERS who park on pavements in the county will face fines from next year, East Lothian Council has said.

New laws introduced this week making pavement parking illegal in Scotland give councils the power to charge offenders.

And East Lothian Council has said that it is currently drawing up plans to enforce the ban across the county.

A meeting of elected members had heard a claim from Scottish Greens councillor Shona McIntosh that the council had "no plans" to take up the new powers.

However, a spokesperson for the council said that work was already under way to introduce fines.

Under the Transport Act (Scotland) 2019, the Scottish Government introduced new regulations which ban parking on pavements, across lowered kerbs and double parking.

The new regulations, which came into effect on Monday, give local authorities the power to fine drivers caught ignoring the regulations, as well as allowing them to exempt some footpaths from the ban under certain circumstances.

Council supports ban

During the council meeting earlier this week, Ms McIntosh raised concerns that the local authority was not taking advantage of the change to legislation and other money-making options available as it faced a budget gap of over £8 million this year.

Ms McIntosh said: “There are revenue options and I feel that we are not exploring them as much as we could be; for instance, there are things like the transient levy which we are still not really doing anything for, workplace parking levies.

“We are still one of only seven local authorities who won’t really charge for parking everywhere and the pavement parking ban came into force this week and I have now been informed we have no plans to start enforcing that either, despite the fact that could raise us revenue.”

A spokesperson for the council said that work was under way to introduce new fines, although no penalty amount had yet been set.

They said: “The council supports the ban and is currently assessing those streets which may be exempt from this new legislation.

"We hope to have concluded this assessment and commence enforcement of the regulations during 2024.”