ON the face of it, Sunderland doesn't appear to have much in common with East Lancashire.

But its traders have a grim warning for folk on this side of the country: parking attendants wreck business.

Like the chill winds which blow off the North Sea through the coastal city, council-appointed parking attendants have been an everyday occurrence in Sunderland since the start of the year.

They arrived after the city council took on the right to 'decriminalise' on-street parking enforcement, a role which had traditionally been carried out by the police. Growing pressure on police resources led to fewer parking regulations being enforced, prompting the Government to decriminalise parking.

In short, council-employed parking attendants do the job, and the service is paid for through the fines - £60 a time.

Any surplus for on-street fines can go to the council to use on highways and environment projects.

Blackpool Council has already started its 'parkright' scheme, Lancashire's ParkWise project 'goes live' next month, and Blackburn with Darwen follows suit in October.

But members of Sunderland's Chamber of Trade blame 20 per cent slumps in business on the wardens, claiming people won't risk parking in front of their shops to nip and get something any more.

Scare stories about wardens pouncing on cars parked 'illegally' for less than 60 seconds are now common in other places across the country where wardens have taken over from the police.

Peter Goldsbrough, Sunderland City Centre manager, said: "What we don't want to do is drive away business and it is debate whether some streets need the wardens."

That has led to a £40,000 city council review of traffic orders in Sunderland.

One of the things which links East Lancashire's scheme to Sunderland is that Lancashire County Council - with the borough councils - has brought private parking firm NCP to provide the staff for their contracts.

"What people need to remember is that if they don't break the regulations, then they won't run the risk of a ticket," said Kevin Almond, networks policies manager for Lancashire County Council.

"Up until now, because of police resources, they haven't been able to enforce the regulations as perhaps they would have liked to, and that causes problems."

In Sunderland, 40,000 tickets a year have to be issued to cover costs of the service. No such figure is available in Lancashire. Councils have a flexible contract with NCP, deciding on a weekly basis how many attendants they want each week.

The cost per hour is not available due to 'commercial sensitivities' said Mr Almond.

"The benefits are that we can determine the problem areas, and staff accordingly. It may be there is a football ground where a lot of people park in breach of the rules, so extra attendants will be deployed.

"There certainly aren't targets for attendants to meet each day to justify their existence. The onus is on the borough councils not to over egg the pudding with too many wardens if there isn't really the need for them because they have to pay any shortfall in funding from tickets."

Around 90 wardens will work across Lancashire's boroughs, including Ribble Valley, which is operating its own scheme. A further 20 wardens will work for Blackburn with Darwen Council when it takes control of its on-street parking regulations in October.

Peter Lowe, from traffic consultants RTA, has worked with both councils setting up their decriminalised parking systems.

He said: "There are a lot of benefits which you can't put a price on.

"Bad parking clogs up streets in town centres.

"In town centres, many people abuse the 'one hour only' parking bays and park all day there. By enforcing the rules, you create space and make it easier for people to park near the shops. That should improve business."

The whole nature of councils keeping any surplus in parking fines has caused concern - thanks in part to the notion from the PR firm promoting ParkWise, who claimed parking fines would help keep council tax down.

Ribble Valley MP Nigel Evans said: "What's to stop the Government turning round in two years and saying 'you can earn extra money this way so we're giving you less'?

"Then we'd get into the realms of more and more tickets being issued just to keep council tax down."

A spokesman for the RAC Foundation said: "In no way should it all be seen as revenue source by the councils. It needs to be done sensibly and transparently."