The cross-party group of MPs criticised the city council for lacking explicit criteria on how to interpret or act on different responses to its consultation. Just 100 businesses responded to the consultation, and, of those, 83 were against the scheme, according to evidence given to the committee.

‘The council appears to assume that the large majority of businesses which will not pay the levy did not respond because they have no strong views on the proposal,’ the MPs said in the Taxes and charges on road-users report.

But Nottingham City Council said the suggestion that its decision on WPL was determined on the basis of a simple majority ‘is wholly incorrect’. ‘In fact, all necessary and appropriate steps were undertaken to ensure that an effective, widespread and comprehensive public consultation took place on the WPL proposals, in accordance with the criteria set out in the Government’s guidelines for consultation and the requirements for a lawful consultation laid down by the courts,’ a council spokesman said.

‘However, we went further than simply inviting written responses to the proposals and we included a “public examination” of the WPL proposals as part of the consultation.’

The spokesman said the examiner’s recommendations helped shape the details of the WPL scheme. The transport committee called on the Government to provide guidance on the criteria on which the results of consultation for specific WPL schemes should be assessed.

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