A NEW firm is to take over the enforcement of Canvey’s main shopping centre car park and plans to get tough with drivers who overstay their tickets.

Euro Car Parks will be responsible for clamping down on illegal parkers at the Knightswick Shopping Centre after it secured a deal with the site’s owner, Manchester-based Tameside Council.

The new firm will introduce fines for drivers who overstay their tickets, replacing the current clamping system.

Under the new rules, businesses in the shopping centre will only be allowed one free parking space, whereas they are currently allowed two.

It is believed businesses will be asked to pay an additional £300 for each extra parking space they require.

One shopowner from the centre, who did not want to be named, said: “It just sounds like a moneyspinner. Why else would this company want to be involved?

“At the moment they are supposed to clamp people, but it’s very relaxed.

“If you start issuing tickets to people who are ten minutes over their ticket you are going to drive people out of the town centre.”

A spokesman for Tameside Council said: “We intend to appoint a private firm to police the car park, but no contract is in place for this at present.

“There will be no price changes and no barrier, but the private operator will introduce fines for vehicles not displaying tickets.”

Castle Point Council has ambitious multi-million-pound plans to regenerate Canvey’s shopping area.

The proposals, which are more than three years old, involve expanding the Sainsbury’s supermarket and building new shops and a town square on the site of the Knightswick Centre car park.

The authority has been in long-term negotiations with landlord Tameside Council to secure the expansion of the Sainsbury’s store, which it hopes will kick-start the proposals.

Dave Blackwell, leader of Canvey Island Independent Party, believes Euro Car Parks’ involvement in the running of the car park means the regeneration proposals are a long way off.

He said: “It makes you wonder. This is a big company. They’re not going to want to take over a car park if the whole thing is soon going to be torn up and replaced by a bigger Sainsbury’s.”