(Cornwall Council L-R: Debbie Brock, Parking Enforcement Manager; Sarah-Jane Brown, Group Leader)

 

Cornwall Council has been named winner of the 2025-26 PATROL Driving Improvement Awards, with a bid focused on the issue of Blue Badge abuse and misuse.

The council’s winning bid, ‘Whose badge is it’, is a campaign combining public engagement with internal enforcement training, including the production of an animated film and new materials to aid prosecutions.

The campaign will be supported by engagement with disability groups and targeted enforcement days, with success measured through increases in public reporting, prosecution outcomes, feedback from genuine badge holders and engagement across social media channels. The council has also proposed a dedicated officer secondment to be focused on Blue Badge abuse during the campaign period.

The Driving Improvement Awards give PATROL’s member authorities the chance to submit a bid for funding to develop a public awareness campaign or activity, with bids encouraged around a specific theme each year, based on current or pressing events, issues and trends in the industry.

Blue Badge abuse and misuse was chosen as the theme for 2025-26 as an area of increasing concern for PATROL’s authority members, and was even recently highlighted by Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer in December last year, who committed the Government to tackling the problem.

Since 2016, a 1000% increase in Blue Badge fraud and misuse has been reported, with some authorities estimating that over 20% of all Blue Badges are misused. Additionally, over 700,000 penalty charge notices have been issued by local authorities in all areas of the UK for contraventions relating to the misuse of disabled parking bays.

Laura Padden, PATROL Director, said: ‘Cornwall’s bid was well thought out and blended a multi-channel awareness campaign and suite of materials for enforcement training and prosecutions. PATROL felt the latter, particularly, would be of great benefit for use by other authorities following the campaign period.

‘The dedicated officer secondment in such a high tourism destination and wide geographic, complex enforcement environment also has huge potential to drive learnings for the benefit of our wider authority cohort.’

Other shorlisted authorities

PATROL was pleased to see such a breadth of high-quality bids addressing Blue Badge abuse for the 2025-26 Driving Improvement Awards funding, with a further three authorities shortlisted in addition to Cornwall:

Gosport Borough Council
Proposed a community-led initiative focused on both intentional and unintentional misuse of Blue Badges, the impact on disabled individuals and the responsibilities of badge holders themselves. This was to be supported by a mix of digital and offline activities, as well as spot-check enforcement.


(Gosport Borough Council L-R: Donna Simpson, Funding Officer;
Councillor Graham Burgess [Gosport BC and PATROL Chair];
Councillor Kirsten Bradley [Gosport BC])

 

Malvern Hills District Council
Proposed a campaign aimed at highlighting the correct use – and consequences of misuse – of Blue Badges, centred on an educational video developed in partnership with a charitable arts organisation, supported by further voluntary and community sector partnerships.


(Evie Pugh, Community Infrastructure and Development Officer,
Malvern Hills District Council)

 

Worcester City Council
Proposed a short film illustrating the impact of misuse, supported by workshops, targeted advertising and collaboration with local disability groups. A new public reporting system was also to be introduced alongside joint enforcement days with local police.


(Worcester City Council L-R: Sandra Green, Head of Service;
Gareth James, Manager;
Samantha Parr, Civil Enforcement Officer;
Councillor Jabba Riaz [Worcester CC])
Next steps

PATROL will be working with Cornwall on the development and launch of its campaign from August, with the council set to activate and report back to the Joint Committee by July 2026.

The organisation’s key aim in awarding funding through the Driving Improvement Awards is for a winning campaign to produce a model or materials that can subsequently be used by other councils moving forward.

 

2024-25 ‘Beyond the Uniform’ campaign provides benchmark for future years

Cornwall’s victory follows a remarkable year for Brighton & Hove City Council and the North Essex Parking Partnership (NEPP), which were jointly awarded the 2024-25 Driving Improvement Award, leading to their ground-breaking campaign, ‘Beyond the Uniform’, aimed at tackling the issue of abuse towards civil enforcement officers and other staff.

The two authorities rolled out Beyond the Uniform for three months from January to March, with the campaign receiving significant engagement, including over a quarter of a million impressions across social media and digital channels, as well as national media interest. In North Essex, a 73% decrease in incidents of abuse was recorded in Harlow during the campaign activation period year-on-year with the same period, with a 60% decrease for the year in full.

As part of this year’s Driving Improvement Awards event, representatives from both councils took to the stage to share their campaign’s journey, with other attending authorities also able to engage directly with the campaign’s outreach materials through NEPP recreating one of its Beyond the Uniform community events within a branded gazebo.


(L-R: Patrick Duckworth, Communications Lead, PATROL;
Jake England, Interim Head of NEPP;
Sarah Baxter, Democratic Services and Policy Manager, PATROL;
Sarah Bussey, Parking Contracts Manager, Brighton & Hove)

 

In the coming months, PATROL will be rolling out the creative assets produced for Beyond the Uniform campaign, white-labelled, for all its authorities to take forward in their own areas and coordinating a wider awareness effort about staff abuse, the campaign and its outcomes.

Laura Padden said: ‘I’m proud to see the early impact of PATROL’s Driving Improvement Awards through the sponsorship and development of the Beyond the Uniform campaign in just its first year of operation. The fantastic results and engagement from Brighton and NEPP demonstrate the value of this England- and Wales-wide programme to inspire and empower local authorities to deliver creative communications that drive change around the big issues in traffic management and enforcement.’