It surely cant be beyond the realms of possiblity to impliment a computer system where upon visiting the hospital, visitors type their Reg number into a little terminal at the door which logs that car as a visitors car or something along those lines.

As you probably know, the nhs is not very good at implementing it systems and there would have to be mutiple terminals ar multiple entrances, down here in sunny west wales the car parking charges are not bad, and i seem to remember at Northampton General hospital you coud buy a weekly pass for about £10 if you had someone in hospital, again because it is a hospital close to the town centre imagine the chaos if parking were free. £4 for 4 hours not bad really, I think anything up to £5-6 isn't unreasonable. What cheeses off swmbo is that when she goes to the staff car park it's full of people without permits who don't want to pay, and they all wonder why we have parking enforcement here dishing out tickets now.

Edited by OldRoverboy on 28/12/2011 at 21:41

Sure the NHS is paid for out of taxes but charging for parking is immoral when you are sick or visiting.

I agree, it shouldn't be chargeable for patients, visitors or employees - but how do you stop all the outsiders using it for free and taking up all the spaces

I fully agree that patients should not pay when visiting a clinic or attending say A & E. But the 4 local-ish hospitals (we don't have one in our town) that I frequent all have drop-off zones so the driver can then go & find a parking space.

I don't think the NHS should be paying for visitors car parking. Again, these same drivers will happily pay to use a mlti-storey car park whilst shopping or visiting other places why not a hospital

I agree, it shouldn't be chargeable for patients, visitors or employees - but how do you stop all the outsiders using it for free and taking up all the spaces.

Its not just the charging, its the fact many hospitals charge stunningly high amounts for parking via private parking companies. My local hospital made £1.5million from parking charges last year, up from around £800,000 just five years ago, of course the hospital denies it profits in any way and all proceeds are to 'maintain the car park' which is the same tarmac and lines they put down 35 years ago so im not sure what needs maintaining.

It also depends on where the hospital is as to whether free parking would be abused, if its right next door to a shopping centre which charges £4 an hour then even a moron could work out people will park at the hospital, if theres no real benefit to parking there then they wont use it. People dont go out just to park places for fun, ive never gone out to do some parking.

The other point is this is nearly 2012, over 40 years after man walked on the moon and you're telling me we have to charge patients and visitors extortionate fees to park at a hospital they've already paid for out of taxes because thats the only way to stop it being used as a free car park for non-users?

I don't think the NHS should be paying for visitors car parking. Again, these same drivers will happily pay to use a mlti-storey car park whilst shopping...

But you dont mind the NHS spending £14billion on a computer system which doesnt work, paying six figure salaries and bonus' to unneccessary managers while leaving a massive nursing shortfall, administrative staff outnumbering beds and still failing miserably to address the need for more NHS dentists.

I also disagree these same drivers will happily pay to use a multi storey whilst shopping, its been widely publicised recently how town centres are struggling, shoppers are refusing to pay sky high parking charges and head for retail parks with free parking instead.

...why not a hospital

Because we've already paid for the hospital once and shouldnt have to pay NCP to be able to park at it.