The council has made a dramatic u-turn over its uncertified CCTV cars blunder and announced it will write to all wrongly-fined drivers and invite them to appeal.

Lord True, leader of Richmond Council, said it would spend up to £700,000 contacting motorists affected by more than 18,500 parking penalties it unlawfully issued between April 2009 and April 2011.

The authority, which said in July it would only refund drivers who responded to adverts, changed its mind amid pressure from campaigners, who accused it of trying to minimise payouts from a £1m reimbursement fund.

Councillor Chris Harrison, cabinet member for highways at Richmond Council, cited at a meeting on Tuesday, September 13, a Richmond and Twickenham Times poll in which 87 per cent of respondents said the council should repay all unlawful parking fines automatically.

Campaigner Nigel Wise, whose landmark appeal against an invalid ticket in Whitton opened the door for thousands of other drivers, said: “This is a grand slam victory in Richmond for common sense.” A tribunal at the Parking and Traffic Appeals Service overturned Mr Wise’s £100 fine after he proved the council had not properly registered its CCTV cars.

It forced the authority to launch an investigation which led to an apology, removal of vehicles and offering to refund all affected motorists.

Lord True said on Tuesday he “deplored” campaigners' claims the council would be guilty of theft if it did not pay back all of the £1m, but he had decided writing to wrongly fined drivers was the “right thing to do”.

He said: “This administration has always wanted to repay as much of the wrongly paid money as we could and we judge this action to be proportionate to the public wrong done.”

Councillor Stephen Knight, leader of Richmond’s Liberal Democrat group, argued the potential £700,000 cost of contacting all the motorists was not a good use of taxpayers’ money.

But Councillor Geoffrey Samuel, deputy leader of Richmond Council, said many affected drivers would not see newspaper adverts about the refunds and the authority had a “moral obligation” to pay them back.

Coun Harrison added: “A central policy of this administration is fair parking and if we take money off people in a process that was fatally flawed, we should offer to pay it back.”

Thirty-one councillors voted in favour of refunding drivers, 17 abstained and none opposed.