Furious Peter Claydon today told how he would rather go to prison than pay a £200 parking fine after claiming officials agreed to waive the penalty because he fell ill.

Mr Claydon, 66, of Stambridge Road, Rochford, parked at Rayleigh town centre car park and paid for half an hour's parking.

He was on his way back to his car when he suffered a sudden bout of sickness and diarrhoea caused by bad reaction to medication for a stomach hernia and an arthritic knee.

Refusing to pay - Peter Claydon and his fine Picture: TERENCE BUNCH

Mr Claydon, who is retired, said: "It was awful. I had to rush off to the public toilets and by the time I felt well enough to make my way back to the car I was ten minutes over the time on the ticket."

He later found a ticket on his windscreen.

Mr Claydon claims he went to protest about the ticket to parking officials in Rochford who are in charge of the car park in Rayleigh and said they had agreed to waive the ticket.

He said: "I thought it had all been forgotten until I got a letter in the post from Southend Magistrates' Court telling me I had missed my court date for non-payment of the parking ticket and had been fined £200.

"I am not going to pay the fine, I would rather go to prison."

Johnathan Desmond, assistant manager of transportation and revenues administration at Rochford District Council, said: "We do not cancel tickets on the spot.

"Nine days after Mr Claydon was issued with a ticket we received a letter of representation from him and we investigated the matter but we did not find a strong enough case to cancel the ticket."

Published Thursday August 22, 2002

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