Free hospital parking in Northern Ireland to be delayed

Legislation passed by the Northern Ireland Assembly in 2022 requires that all hospital parking charges in Northern Ireland be removed by 12 May 2024, ensuring free parking across Health and Social Care (HSC) hospital sites for all staff, patients and visitors.

“It is deeply concerning that despite legislation being passed two years ago, there is the prospect that this will be delayed”

Rita Devlin

But Northern Ireland health minister Robin Swann has announced that he would be asking the assembly to defer introduction of free hospital parking for two years, citing “practical obstacles” with the planned introduction date as well as budgetary pressures as main reasons for the delay.

Nursing Times previously reported that a U-turn on free hospital parking was to be expected, when a proposal to repeal the legislation was put out for consultation in November last year.

In a statement issued on Monday, Mr Swann said that he remained “entirely supportive” of the intentions behind the Hospital Parking Charges Act (Northern Ireland) 2022, but that “logistical issues” made the planned roll out of free parking in May 2024 “unfeasible”.

The assembly will be asked to agree to the deferral of the free parking legislation by accelerated passage to prevent it coming into effect on 12 May.

The Department of Health has said that while the total removal of all parking charges is to be deferred, car parking permits for “eligible staff” would be provided free of charge across the two-year period.

The logistical obstacles to free parking cited by Mr Swann include legal challenges delaying a contract for automatic number plate recognition technology on hospital sites.

This technology is needed for the traffic management system that would mean HSC trusts can ensure safe access to their sites for patients, clients, visitors and staff. Preserving blue light routes is a particular concern.

“My primary concern as minister is to protect access to hospitals for legitimate users,” Mr Swann said.

“Free parking without traffic management could very quickly lead to a free for all, with serious consequences for traffic not just in hospital sites but in surrounding areas,” he added.

The minister also said that the financial position of the health service had deteriorated in the past two years, so the loss of £10m annual income from parking charges to the budget was a concern.

“It is widely agreed that the current budgetary situation will require difficult decisions by the executive and assembly. Deferring the introduction of free hospital parking certainly falls into that category,” he said.

“My primary concern as minister is to protect access to hospitals for legitimate users”

Robin Swann

Director of the Royal College of Nursing (RCN) in Northern Ireland Rita Devlin said that she was “deeply disappointed” that the free parking legislation would not be going into effect as planned.

“For a number of years the RCN has called for free car parking for healthcare staff,” she said.

“We campaigned vigorously in support of this legislation, through the submission of written and oral evidence to the Northern Ireland Assembly Committee for Health that articulated the concerns of our members at the impact of parking charges on the nursing workforce and patients and visitors.”

Ms Devlin added that access to car parking varied greatly and that there were serious inequalities and inconsistencies in relation to charging rates across Northern Ireland.

“Some of our members struggle to get by due to a fall in the real value of nurses’ salaries and additional car parking charges are a further tax on this,” she said.

“In some cases, nursing staff were paying £11 a day to park their car. This is completely unacceptable.

“It is deeply concerning that despite legislation being passed two years ago, there is the prospect that this will be delayed.

“We believe this is an unfair financial burden on healthcare staff and are deeply disappointed that it has not been implemented as planned.”