A WHOPPING 14,000 parking tickets have been wrongly issued in Worcester since the city council started managing the system because staff were not trained properly.

The city council has admitted the error which would have recouped the authority £420,000 - at £30 a ticket - if they had been issued correctly.

The council admitted the mistake was down to not training parking attendants properly.

Many fines were withdrawn because cars were slapped with tickets despite parking in spots where double yellow lines were clearly broken.

The council said it was "not a nice figure" - and is midway through a major review to shake up the system.

All 14,000 drivers have been let off their tickets as a result of the errors. Those who have paid will be refunded.

The council was not able to give the financial cost of the errors but said it leaves an "administrative" burden in wasted staff time.

Coun Martin Clarke, cabinet member for urban renaissance, said: "It is a concern because 14,000 is not a nice figure.

"It is a question of staff being properly trained to avoid it happening.

"Something clearly needs doing, although ideally there would not be any parking fines handed out because citizens would park in the right place.

"We are trying to make a balance in terms of educating people not to park in certain places, and while this review is being done, I will keep the powder dry on what needs to be done."

Once the review is complete, the system will face its biggest shake up since the council took over the running of parking fines from the police in 2003.

A special halfway report' obtained by the Worcester News also reveals the number of parking tickets issued in the city has dropped 38 per cent since 2003.

In the first year of it being run by the council, 14,000 parking fines were issued compared to just 9,200 in 2005.

The numbers for 2006 have not yet been calculated but may show a further drop.

The halfway report, produced by a team of five councillors at the Guildhall, acknowledges an extra team of six parking attendants are needed out of the city centre.

The report also calls for a community safety officer to work for the city council to help with the enforcement.

There are currently around a dozen parking attendants working for the city council.

Coun Mike Layland, who is helping with it, said: "The 14,000 wrongly issued fines came about because we have had inexperienced people do a specialist job. We're bound to be faced with teething problems."

The scheme is self financing, although 690 fines need to be issued by each parking attendant per year to avoid it losing money.

The review is expected to be complete next month, resulting in a full report for council leaders to take on board.

The tickets no longer have sticky sides for fixing to windscreens for environmental reasons.