Cafe owner calls for permit change after £1000 fines

A restaurant and cafe owner says she is being penalised "due to a technicality" and has accumulated about £1,000 in fines after a congestion charge permit was refused.

Lula Kinnaird owns both Lula's Ethiopian Restaurant in Frideswide Square and Lula's Café & Deli in the Covered Market in Oxford.

She said that she applied for the permit "in good faith" but was refused "due to the structure of [her] vehicle insurance". Bernadette Evans, leader of Oxford Business Action Group said Lula is not the only owner being "impacted in this way".

Oxfordshire County Council said permits were available but people using personal car as a goods vehicle must show that the vehicle is insured for business use.

Although the vehicle is registered under Kinnaird's company, the insurance is in her personal name.

As an independent business owner, she said city centre car travel is "essential and not optional" as she transports "food supplies, stock, and maintenance equipment" every day.

Kinnaird said that a change in her vehicle insurance could more than double her costs and that the insurance requirements to get a permit represent a "disproportionate burden for a small independent business" at a time when "the hospitality sector is already under considerable pressure".

Kinnaird added: "I am not trying to avoid compliance.

"I have made genuine efforts to follow the correct process and feel that I am being penalised due to a technicality that does not reflect my actual usage."

Evans said businesses received assurances that "private cars used by trades and businesses to transport tools and goods" would have permits available.

She added: "Once the congestion charge was implemented, it became apparent that business owners can only apply for an exemption if they have business insurance for their car.

"For many, this meant a massive, unaffordable increase in their premiums at a time when it's often difficult to make ends meet.

"This has impacted many people, including tradesmen who use the family estate car to transport tools, business owners like Lula who uses her own car to drop off goods at her restaurant and people earning a few extra pennies from cleaning jobs who have had to give them up."

She called the situation "just another layer of unnecessary difficulty and bureaucracy at what a challenging time is already".

A spokesperson for Oxfordshire County Council said there are permits available for a "personal car used as goods vehicle", and "business car used as goods vehicle" created after feedback.

They added: "For the "personal car used as a goods vehicle" permit you must show that the vehicle is insured for business use.

"If it isn't, and the vehicle is used for business purposes, even if only occasionally, the user will not be insured."

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