THE number of drivers slapped with parking tickets across Worcester has tumbled - with council chiefs forecasting a whopping £106,000 shortfall.

Your Worcester News can reveal how Worcester City Council, which fined 16,886 people last year, had expected to take £540,000 from motorists for 2015/16.

But due to a plunge in the number of parking fines that forecast is now set to end up around £106,000 short.

That shortfall is worth more than 3,000 parking tickets, based on a £70 fine being paid within 14 days at the discounted rate of £35.

The data has led to some councillors questioning if the council has enough parking wardens digging around the city - or whether motorists' have curbed their behaviour.

We can reveal how the city council currently has 15 active wardens - known as Civil Enforcement Officers (CEOs) - but two vacancies.

The findings were debated during a meeting of the performance, management and budget scrutiny committee at the Guildhall.

Labour Councillor Lynn Denham said: "Parking is a major problem and illegal parking does have a real impact on the city.

"People do expect a level of enforcement in the city and the truth is, it hasn't been up to the mark."

Conservative Councillor Alan Feeney asked if people are "behaving themselves better, or are we not enforcing it".

During the debate Councillor Stephen Hodgson, who chairs the committee, pointed to problems with people parking on grass verges in Warndon Villages before heading to Sixways for Worcester Warriors matches.

"It is important parking is properly enforced, it'd also help the budgets too," he said.

Bosses insisted they made no profit from parking fines - by law they are not supposed to - and said the service runs at a loss.

Mark Baldwin, from the finance team, said: "Overall we don't make any profits from parking tickets.

"I've debated this long and hard and the team are not telling me this is down to a lack of feet on the ground."

The cash from it goes back into employing the wardens and maintaining parking facilities across the city.

The £106,000 predicted shortfall is made up £78,000 from council car parks or yellow line offences, and £28,000 for offences with on-street parking bays.

In the last financial year the council raked in £490,080 from fines - a figure now forecast to dip to £434,000 for 2015/16, which runs to the end of March.