The Andalusian Ombudsman for Granada has called on the Granada City Hall to reduce the ‘disproportionate’ amount of traffic fines levied in the city.

Just in case you think that the municipal police are being over zealous, it’s not them, but a car with cameras belonging to a private company which gives the City Hall a cut. The result is that Granada hands out more fines than other provincial capitals of the same size and even bigger.

Apart from the call from the Ombudsman to ease off, he is also carrying out an exhaustive investigation into what has been going on.

As a direct result the offending ‘camera car’ has been grounded and the policemen in charge of it returned to normal duty. For a fine to be legal, it has to be a policeman or public functionary that signs it, hence a policeman operating the car, even though it belongs to a private company.

The opposition party claim that this high fining activity is just a ploy to rake in extra funds for a municipal economy that is being badly run.

The said vehicle, called Multacar, knocked out 6,871 fines during 2014, where as the previous year there were only 606 – something smells fishy, indeed.

(News: Metropolitan Area, Granada, Andalucia)