Parking wardens marched through Camden Town on Saturday

DOZENS of striking parking wardens are coaching it up to Birmingham to protest against a bailiff giant’s top bosses.

The Unison union members are demonstrating against Marston Holdings – the parent company of Camden’s parking contractor, NSL.

It follows a rain-soaked march on Saturday “into traffic” in Camden High Street, a protest outside the council’s headquarters on Monday and daily pickets at Camden depots in Kentish Town and King’s Cross.

Unison branch secretary Liz Wheatley said: “Spirits are high. We are determined to win and convinced we can win. We have picket lines, strike meetings, marches – and now we are going up in a coach to Birmingham to protest outside Marston Holdings.”

Marston Holdings, which provides debt collection services for local authorities across the country including Camden, also owns Camden’s parking contractor NSL.

NSL has refused to meet Unison’s demands for pay, leading to the “indefinite” strike that entered its third week this week.

The wardens are demanding £15.90 an hour – up from £12.70. NSL has made an offer of a 4.5 per cent increase and an improved offer this week that has been rejected by Unison.

Ms Wheatley said: “They made an offer we said wasn’t good enough, so we sent that back saying come back with a significant improvement and we’ll talk to you.”

NSL published its annual accounts this week showing top directors’ annual pay had increased from around £258,000 to £412,000 a year and the operating profit had surged to £9m from £5.8m.

“When you see these salaries we reckon it’s not outrageous to ask for £15.90 an hour,” said Ms Wheatley.

She said the council could not be excused from blame for the stand-off as it had contracted the company to run its parking services.

“This is a service provided on behalf of Camden Council and therefore the council needs to do the right thing and make NSL pay decent wages to their workers,” she said.

There is virtually no parking enforcement in Camden due to the industrial action of the wardens who work in difficult conditions.

Last week told the New Journal how they had been spat on, run over and even “abducted” by irate drivers. The council has said it hopes the union and its contractor can resolve the dispute.

A Marston Holdings statement said: “We have proposed a third and significantly increased offer of 18.1 per cent over three years to Camden Unison which would take the lowest paid staff to £15 an hour from April 2025. However, this was not seen as a big enough offer by the union to attend an ACAS meeting which is maintaining that a 25.2 per cent increase now is the minimum to end the strike.

“We understand that striking staff are being financially supported by the branch to continue the action so there is little incentive for them to return to work. “We, however, remain open to a proposal from the union which is achievable, as opposed to being around triple the rate of inflation.”