AN ANGRY York mother has fallen victim to a council "three day rule" on wiping CCTV footage.

Prue Young, from Acomb, had her car written off by a hit-and-run driver after leaving it in Nunnery Lane Car Park for 20 minutes.

She immediately contacted the police, who said they would alert the council to get them to check the relevant CCTV footage in the hope of catching the culprit.

After hearing nothing for a week she contacted the authority - who said the tapes had been wiped because it had not been notified within three days.

Mrs Young has been forced to scrap the car and fork out for another as she only had third-party insurance which required the culprit to cover the cost.

Ironically, the council now keeps footage for one month and runs a 24-hour monitoring from Fulford Road Police Station.

Mrs Young said: "I don't know how this happened.

"I presumed the police and council would sort it out between them.

"Something obviously went wrong somewhere, but now the evidence has been destroyed.

"It's really annoyed me that someone has got away with blatant criminal damage and I'm the one who has to fork out for a new car. I was banking on tracking down the culprit so they could pay.

"I'm not pointing any fingers, but I don't feel I was given enough information.

"I hope the new system is more efficient."

Mrs Young has now raised the issue with her ward councillor, Tracey Simpson-Laing.

A City of York Council spokeswoman said: "The council has a responsibility to monitor the CCTV scheme operating in our car parks. Had we received information about this incident, we would have monitored the tapes and if there had been any evidence, made it available - but unfortunately we didn't receive it.

"Council staff this week moved to Fulford Road police

station where they will begin, in due course, 24 hour CCTV monitoring not only of car parks but across the city.

"Since 1992 we have kept tapes for seven days, but with the introduction of more cameras during the last six weeks, pending our move to Fulford Road, we've temporarily been storing them for three days, because of lack of space.

"We can now keep tapes for one month.

"If anyone wants to view the CCTV tapes because of a crime-related incident, then people will usually contact the police and us within one day, enabling us to check the tapes."

A spokesman for York police said normal procedure was to inform the council to get them to check CCTV footage.

Updated: 11:45 Friday, August 02, 2002