COUNCILLORS have rejected a report recommending the introduction of car parking charges.

If approved, people would have to pay to park their cars in Consett and Stanley town centres as well as near shops in the district's villages.

Derwentside District Council members heard it would cost the authority £380,000 to implement pay-for-parking ticket machines, maintenance, CCTV cameras and lighting columns.

It was estimated that charges would bring in about £170,000 a year for the first five years.

A report was prepared by John Shepherd, head of general services, and Peter Reynolds, director of environmental services.

They said it would demonstrate that the authority was maximising its assets and tackle the problem of congestion in town centres.

The profit could be reinvested to improve the quality of car parks and encourage drivers to be more responsible with their vehicles.

Disadvantages included alienating the public, the fact it could be seen as unfair on low-paid workers and could discourage people from using town centres.

The report said: "Car parking charges in Stanley are an obvious way forward, not only in terms of effective town centre management, by properly regulating traffic management for our major settlements, but also in terms of improving the vitality and viability or our major trading centres.

"The work that has been done shows that we need to have that turnover of key car parking spaces, rather than allow them to be monopolised all day by free all-day parking, and encourages people to visit our shopping centres to improve our town centres."

The recommendation was rejected by members of the learning and economy scrutiny panel.

They asked officers to reopen talks with Durham County Council with a view to creating a co-ordinated strategy to manage the parking problems of Stanley and Consett.

Councillor Janice Docherty led the case against charging in Stanley, saying the town faces years of parking upheaval while the town centre regeneration takes place.

Councillor Owen Temple argued for a forum of all stakeholders in Consett, where three out of four car park spaces are owned by organisations other than the council.

He said: "Charging introduced without other measures to control on-street parking would simply move the problem into the surrounding streets.

"Councils, traders, car park owners and local residents needed to meet together to hammer out a coherent solution to the problem."