Plans to charge for parking where previously it was free have been challenged by backbenchers and businesses.

At the start of the month, the Conservative-led cabinet at Tonbridge and Malling introduced a number of measures affecting parking across the borough.

They intend to start charging motorists who park in Swan Street and in the High Street in West Malling, where previously parking had been limited to one hour but was free.

They also want to charge in the two free Bailey Bridge car parks at Aylesford and in the free Martin Square car park in Larkfield, with drivers being charged £1.80 for an hour, up to £3.80 for four hours.

The cabinet also decided to extend parking fees from 6pm until 8pm right across the borough, and to start charging for the first time on Sundays and bank holidays.

All of the measures had been subject to a public consultation, and all had resulted in a big majorities against the new charges.

Angry that the public’s will was being ignored, some backbenchers on the borough’s overview and scrutiny committee called in the decisions for further debate.

On the introduction of parking charges at Martin Square in Larkfield, the committee heard from two public speakers.

Barry Smith, the chairman of the Martin Square Traders Association, told councillors that residents were angry that their views were being ignored.

He said the charges would “adversely affect the well-being and fragile structure of our community,” pointing out that Martin Square was next to an area of deprivation.

He said the charge would lead to more empty shops and a loss of income for the council, which owns the buildings.

He said the mitigation proposed of 30 minutes free parking was “totally inadequate.”

He was supported by Dr Robert Gilmore of Thornhills Medical Practice, based in the square.

Dr Gilmore said the practice had only moved there because of the free parking.

He said charges would put off vulnerable people, who sometimes had to visit the surgery two or three times a week, from coming.

He added it would add to the surgery’s hardship in keeping staff, who wouldn’t be able to afford to pay to park.

He told the council: “This is a terrible decision.”

Several councillors agreed.

Cllr David Thornewell (Lib Dem) said the free parking had been built into past decisions - a butcher, newly moved onto the square, wouldn’t have done so if he knew the free parking was about to disappear.

Cllr Bill Banks (Lib Dem) described the charges as “anti-business.”

While Cllr Paul Boxell described the concession of half an hour’s free parking as “just throwing the dog a bone.”

He said even an hour wasn’t enough time for a normal visit to the shops.

Cllr Robert Cannon (Con) proposed returning the issue to the cabinet with the recommendation that the free period be increased to one hour.

His motion was passed by 12 votes to four, with one abstention.

On the issue of introducing charges at the two Bailey Bridge Car parks in Aylesford, the committee heard from local trader Nichola Ewell of Beauty Bank.

She told the committee that the High Street was comprised almost exclusively of service businesses, whose customers required a long stay. Parking charges would put off customers and hit again traders who still hadn’t recovered fully from the effects of Covid.

She said: “This will be the final nail in the coffin.”

The cabinet had previously acknowledged that, unlike most car parks, the Bailey Bridge car park was heavily used by local residents who had nowhere else to go.

Along with the charges, it proposed offering residents a permit at £200 a year and extending one car park to add extra spaces.

Cllr Roger Dalton (Con) questioned whether any extension was even possible, saying it had been looked at before and found to be unworkable.

Cllr Dave Davis (Con) said that bringing in such large charges at such short notice was unfair, saying: “People need time to adapt.”

He proposed sending the matter back to cabinet with the recommendation that the price of the season ticket be dropped from £200 to £120 a year, that a number of spaces be reserved exclusively for residents and that no charges be introduced until the car park extension had been completed and opened.

His motion was passed by general affirmation.

On the proposal to extend parking charges until 8pm and to charge for the first time on Sundays and bank holidays, the committee heard from Teresa Seema, of Gorgeous George, a gift shop in Tonbridge High Street.

She warned that the town had already lost its banks and the Post Office from the High Street and there was increasingly less to draw in customers.

She said: “Parking charges are driving people to shop online or to go to out-of-town centres where parking is free.”

She was particularly opposed to parking charges on a Sunday, which at present was her store’s busiest trading day.

She said: “Charges could be the final straw that kills our High Street.”

Martin Guyton, the managing director of the T&M Leisure Trust that runs the Angel Centre and Tonbridge Swimming Pool, was also concerned about what effect the evening and Sunday parking charges would have on his customers.

He had calculated, based on the average number of visits by his members, that they would each have to find another £27 a month to pay for parking.

But he had a solution.

He said the Trust was willing to pay the borough £45,000 a year, in exchange for free evening and Sunday car parking for its members - for as long as the Angel Centre remained open (there are ambitions to demolish it and build a new centre elsewhere.)

His offer seemed to be acceptable to the council leader, Cllr Matt Boughton, who was in the chamber.

Cllr Frani Hoskins (Lib Dem) said: “It sounds like we will get some help for the leisure centre users, but there are other groups meeting in the town in the evening like the [retiree organisation] U3A that will be affected by this.”

She said to put them at risk was “absolutely wicked.”

Cllr Anna Cope (Green) suggested the cut-off at 8pm had been an arbitrary figure. She said: “I‘ve seen no data to show the difference if we charged till 7pm, till 7.30pm or till 8pm.”

She said: “There was such widespread public disapproval of the charges (in the public consultation). The people’s voices are being dismissed and confidence in the council will be damaged.”

Cllr Bridge (Lib Dem) agreed. He said: “8pm seems a very arbitrary cut off.”

Pointing out that 96% of people had opposed the new charges, he said: “We have to take people with us.”

He said: “I don’t own a car, so I won’t be affected, but I do want to see vibrant town centre (which this is putting at risk).”

Cllr Dennis King (Con) disagreed.

He said: “We (Tonbridge and Mallling) are an island of low parking charges. All our neigbours charge far more.)

Cllr Adem Mehmet (Con) said he was confident that the high street “could succeed with or without the charges.”

But he said there was a need to look to the future and the council’s finances.

He said: “If we don’t implement these charges, I still haven’t heard where the savings would come from elsewhere.”

Cllr Sarah Hudson (Con) described imposing the charges as “the least worst option.”

Green councillors Mark Hood and Anna Cope offered a compromise of granting an hour’s free parking on a Sunday.

At that stage, council leader Cllr Boughton stepped in and offered that the cabinet would look again at the issue, but would need to do further research on the practicality of offering an hour free.

He said: “It will be important to understand the financial implications of that.”

His recommendation was accepted by the committee chairman Cllr Anita Oakley (Lib Dem).

Opponents of the introduction of on-street parking fees in West Malling High Street were less successful.

Cllr Trudy Dean (Lib Dem) said the move would hit business hard, as visitors could shop instead at a range of available out-of-town supermarkets, where parking was free.

She pointed out that 94% of people in the council’s consultation exercise had opposed the move.

She was also concerned about the effect on the look of the High Street which was a Conservation Area, pointing out that West Malling Parish Council had conducted a programme of works to take street lamps and waste bins off the pavements, and place them less intrusively on the walls.

Now the borough was proposing to install six large parking payment machines on the pavement in front of Grade II-listed buildings.

She said: “It will be an act of vandalism.

But she failed to convince her colleagues.

A motion to refer the matter back to the cabinet was lost by five votes to nine, with three abstentions.

There was unanimous support

for a proposal to abandon plans for an extension of the Upper Castle Fields car park into a green space much used by children from the adjacent Slade School.

The cabinet will consider the committee’s motions, but is not bound by any of them.

Before the debate, Cllr Boughton said the council was spending £294,000 a year on business rates for its car parks, £188,000 on CCTV and £71,500 just on emptying the ticket machines.

And cabinet member Cllr Kim Tanner (Con) had emphasised the council’s need to find a further £1.67 million of savings (or extra income) by 2028.

She said: “We have a balanced budget at the moment, but we need to protect our sustainability into the future.”

Cabinet member Mike Taylor (Independents Alliance) said: “My fundamental principle is that the cost of parking should be met by the motorist and not by the general public.”

However, during the evening, the council’s director of finance and transformation, Sharon Smith, revealed the parking budget had actually made a surplus last year of £1.1m, so in fact it is the motorist who is already subsidising the council’s other activities.

The parking policy will be discussed at an extraordinary meeting of the cabinet tomorrow (Tuesday, April 30).