Councils to urge Government to block parking fees in Richmond and Bushy Park (From Your Local Guardian)

The reality is that the Royal Parks Agency (RPA) is wholly unaccountable whatever spin the government place on Ms Follett's role.

The facts are that the RPA will do what it wants and does not care what people think even though we pay the bills.

The Tories are correct that these sorts of Quangos must be scrapped and new, transparent mechanisms created only in very exceptional circumstances to safeguard financial prudence.

Phillip - a lot of Quangos were set up by the Tories, but I agree that Labour have gone OTT. However, some do actaully serve a purpose. They have more freedom from interference by career civil servants, who from my experience, don't know what they are doing and have even less accountability and transparency then most Quangos. There are too many though. The Tories said they would review them, not get rid of them, so don't be too hopeful.

Generally the RPA has done a good job. Having used both parks for at least 30 years, I can see an improvement in the facilites and general maintenance. We are very lucky in our borough to have these facilities. The RPA is under of lot pressure to look for ways of raising funds. If our stupid council contributed some of it's budget to the RPA on the grounds that locals use these parks, this would ease the pressure somewhat. Instead they p**s it away on developments we don't want (Twickenham riverside and re paving pavemnts that don't need it are examples) and egenrally act in an arrogant attitude (the meals on wheels saga is a classic). I think they have a cheek to to make a comment on this when they don't fulfil committments they are supposed to have, such as painting the roadside furniture around Hampton Court (Hampton court now do it themsleves - bet they don't get a rate rebate). Perhaps they have suddenly realised an election will coming up next year, or am I being cynical....

On the argument that charging for parking in the Royal Park will mean local streets getting clogged up: to be honest I'm surprised to find that people who don't seem to mind paying for the insurance needed to get a car on the public roads in the first place, and the fuel needed to make it go anywhere, are going to be such skinflints that they can't spare 50p or £1 or so to park it.

If people are *that* hard up, surely they would abandon their cars completely, wouldn't they? And wouldn't that solve the problem?

My view is that the needs of the people would be best served by having parking charges, and by having a concession scheme for those of lesser mobility. The charges would act as a disincentive against people using their cars to come to the Royal Parks when they're able to get there by other means. This will also act as a disincentive against travelling long distances to get to the park, thereby ensuring that the park is primarily used by local people.

Having said all that, we have to remember that the Royal Park is a national resource. So it's absolutely right that they are not "accountable" in the same way we'd expect a local authority to be "accountable". I agree with abandit, the RPA have done quite well over the years.

It's not as if parks management is safety critical in the same way that management of transport infrastructure, acute hospital services, fire services or housing stock is. So it's not appropriate to get all hot under the collar about what RPA does and doesn't do, in my opinion. If you want a compelling example of why you think quangos should be scrapped, I'm afraid the RPA isn't it; you'd do better to nail a quango that's in charge of something more safety critical, or more critical to the economy instead. Just a thought.