I was struck, when the smoking ban came in, that the effect on me was the opposite of that intended. I spend far more time on pavements than I do in pubs and trapping the smoke inside a pub protected me from it most of the time. Now it happens on pavements I am irritated by smoke more often. But the objection is also a principled one. If it means anything to own a building then it should include the right to control what happens there as well as the responsibility, enforced by the market, to balance the competing desires of customers that visit. The smoking ban usurped the rights of landlords and enforced a State decree on their land, but left a hedonistic situation on the State owned pavements untouched. Authority was applied in reverse proportion to ownership – it was backwards.

The situation today with banning of clamping creates a similarly backward situation. The state has every right to enforce clamping, or not, on its land but a ban on clamping on private land usurps the very meaning of the word “private”. Of course, the owner of the car has rights too. They are responsible for and expect control the car. The application of a clamp obviously usurps their rights, or does it?

Private means that the public has no right to be on a bit of land, no agreement exists and a trespass dispute is the default position.  If I drive onto private land I am aware that there may be rules set out, a 5 mph speed limit or the expectation that I will park between lines painted onto the ground. I expect and look for those lines, those signals of the owners intent, as I enter and I go along with them out of respect and self-interest. Further, I know that parking is often an issue and there will be some kind of dispute if I do not understand and follow the land owners intended scheme. I know that these schemes vary between sites and that must look for a sign. If I leave my car there, in my self-interest, then the land owner has every right to expect that I have agreed to his posted set of rules – there is an implied contract. If that contract means my car will be clamped as a form of sanction, and to aid the enforcement of a fee, then naturally I should go along with that too.