YET two more letters about the unreasonableness and excesses of our traffic wardens (Can Anyone Help Me Fight Ticket?, News Shopper, May 17).

What sort of person earns their living this way?

They must be as thick as two short planks, otherwise they would earn an honest living.

One 60-year-old I know told me never in his lifetime has he ever felt any desire to hit anybody until he emerged from a friend's house, in a quiet road, carrying a heavy object and found a warden slapping a ticket on his van after being parked there for two minutes.

How are repair men and delivery drivers expected to do their jobs?

Are doctors, district nurses and removal men targeted too?

A traffic warden's job should be to keep traffic moving, not swooping on drivers in quiet back roads which have no need of the petty restrictions imposed by anti-car councils.

I read recently, and perhaps a lawyer can confirm, by some ancient statute Magna Carta only a court of law can impose a monetary penalty.

Until recently, only HM Customs had the power to impose an instant penalty, and this is because of the transient nature of the offender passengers and crews of ships and aircraft. But they always had the option of going to court.

Perhaps if every driver who felt unreasonably treated exercised this option, traffic wardens might think twice.

The root cause is, of course, the need to meet targets.

Our council would know instant popularity and might ensure continuity of tenure, if it not only came up with a sensible traffic management policy, but also instructed Sureways' successor to trust its staff to do their job properly, abandon targets and encourage its wardens to exercise some common sense. Pigs might fly.

A J BURNETT
Bexleyheath