URGENT repairs should be carried out to a Caister car park if the borough council is to continue charging there, according to the chairman of the village's parish council.

URGENT repairs should be carried out to a Caister car park if the borough council is to continue charging there, according to the chairman of the village's parish council.

Tony Overill said the borough council-owned Beach Road car park had been plagued with pot hole problems and a rutted surface, but the situation had become worse because of the icy winter.

He said: “It is a total mess. The car park's surface has got more pot holes in it than Joseph's coat and now that we have had this harsh winter there are even more pot holes in the ground.”

He added: “If the borough council is going to continue charging during the summer months, really what that car park needs to have done is for the surface to be pulled up, replaced, and for proper parking spaces to be put in.”

Caister residents and councillors have been fighting to overturn fees at the car park during the summer tourist season to prevent holidaymakers clogging nearby roads with their cars to avoid the parking charges.

Manor Road and Beach Road are considered to be the worst affected and the campaign started in September 2008 when borough councillor Marie Field, collected a 266-signature petition calling for the charges to be dropped during the summer months.

However, last December, the campaigners appeared to have lost their fight after the borough council's car park steering group rejected proposals by Cllr Field for the fees to be dropped.

Hope was renewed in January when a government ombudsman agreed to look into how theborough council had handled the case.