Canterbury City Council Bill

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. This is another unfair element of the Bill. Of course, if someone reserves the right not to pay the fixed penalty notice, they would presumably find themselves in court and it would be for the court to decide whether or not they should have to pay. I am sure my hon. Friend would agree that that creates a big financial risk for the pedlar concerned, who has to take a gamble—it could be quite a costly gamble in many cases—where he feels that he has done nothing wrong yet has been served with this fixed penalty notice. I suspect that in many cases even people who feel that they have been badly done by would feel obliged to pay the fixed penalty notice because of fear about a much bigger penalty further down the line. My hon. Friend is absolutely right that these notices could be given out in a far too willy-nilly way for my liking. This legislation, which we are on the verge of passing today, will allow the authorities to hand out these fixed penalty notices willy-nilly—in a way that I think most people would consider unreasonable.