On-street parking around Bucks has cost the county council more than £900,000 over the past two years, it has been revealed.

A Freedom of Information (FOI) request by The Marlow Society chairman Martin Blunkell shows that Bucks County Council lost out on a total of £907,200 of net revenue from the county-wide on-street parking account between 2015 and 2017.

The FOI showed that the council lost £251,600 in 2015/16 and £655,600 in 2016/17.

Mr Blunkell is now questioning whether Marlow will have to pay for the losses with the controversial new parking proposals put forward by BCC.

Under the new plans residents could have to pay £1 per hour or 20p per 12 minutes to park in the centre of the town.

The FOI request also revealed that the estimated gross revenue from putting paid for parking on the streets of Marlow is £379,000.

Mr Blunkell said in a letter to the Marlow Free Press: “Instead of Bucks CC tackling the problem of a significant loss on its county wide operation it appears that Marlow is being required to compensate for the seriously underperforming operation management of its on street parking regime.”

In response to the criticisms, BCC spokesman Rosemary Bryant said: “The reason for using parking enforcement to manage on-street parking is to increase safety, reduce congestion and facilitate turnover over of parking spaces in busy areas to increase town centre shopping.

“We look forward to the responses to the consultation when it opens in January and these will assist Buckinghamshire County Council Members in making a final decision on the options.”

- Read Mr Blunkell’s full letter on p20 of this week’s Marlow Free Press.