Edinburgh Council Says 50 LEZ Debtors Owe Almost £530,000 as Fines Go Unpaid

• The City of Edinburgh Council issued 37,092 Low Emission Zone penalty notices between April 2025 and March 2026, and 73.7% of them were paid, according to its Year 2 annual report.
• Around 19% of LEZ notices where a keeper can be traced are unpaid, and the 50 biggest debtors owe almost £530,000 across 864 notices, with the largest single debtor owing more than £20,000.
• A further 7.1% of notices could not be issued, with the council pointing to missing or inaccurate keeper records held by the DVLA. The zone raised £1,225,658 and left a net surplus of £441,578.

Edinburgh Council Says 50 LEZ Debtors Owe Almost £530,000 While 19 Percent of Fines Go Unpaid

The City of Edinburgh Council has published the second annual report on its Low Emission Zone, covering April 2025 to March 2026. It describes a scheme that is raising money but is not collecting everything it charges. The council issued 37,092 penalty charge notices in the year, and the report says 73.7% of them were paid.

The unpaid share is where the detail sits. Paragraph 2.11 of the report says around 19% of LEZ penalty notices where a keeper can be traced are unpaid. The report sets that against 15% for bus lane notices and 11% for parking notices, which makes the Low Emission Zone the hardest of the three to collect on.

Debt that stays unpaid is passed to sheriff officers, who recover money owed to the council. The report says they recovered an additional £230,000 of LEZ income in the year. Even so, the top 50 debtors currently owe the council almost £530,000 across 864 notices, and the largest individual debtor owes more than £20,000.

Those figures are worth slowing down on. Spread across 50 debtors, almost £530,000 comes to roughly £10,600 each, and 864 notices means each of them has about 17 outstanding. The report does not say whether the debtors are private drivers or businesses, so it does not show what kind of vehicle owner sits behind the largest debts.

The report also records that 7.1% of notices could not be issued, with the cause given as missing or inaccurate keeper records held by the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency. That second finding is covered further down. It points to a gap in data the council does not control.

What the Year 2 Report Says About Who Is Not Paying

The report does not break unpaid notices down by driver type, vehicle or postcode, so it cannot say who is behind the 19%. It does show how the council tries to get the money back. Notices that go unpaid are passed to sheriff officers, and the report puts the sheriff officers figure at £230,000 recovered in the year.

The council has described the unpaid problem differently in public. STV News reported in February that the transport convener, Councillor Stephen Jenkinson, told a full council meeting: “There are a low number of unpaid LEZ fines.” He also gave a figure of 77% of notices paid on time, and a council spokesperson said that figure included data from outside the period covered by the first annual report. The Year 2 report puts the paid share at 73.7% for April 2025 to March 2026.

Drivers who challenge a notice and lose can take the case to the independent tribunal. The report says 61 LEZ appeals were heard. The council won 21 of them. A further 19 were not contested by the council, 12 were withdrawn, 8 were allowed in the appellant’s favour and 1 is awaiting a decision. The report gives no success rate. Eight allowed out of 61 heard works out to about 13%, and the 19 cases the council chose not to contest sit outside that figure.

The first annual report gave a far larger count of challenges at council level. STV News reported that 3,074 challenges to LEZ notices were made and that 2,773 charges were reversed, which is about 90%. The reasons given for reversals included blue badge holders who had not applied for an exemption, wrong vehicle information from the DVLA, vehicles forced into the zone by roadworks, and cases where the council elected not to pursue the debt. The Year 2 report states no cancellation count, so this year’s challenges cannot be set beside last year’s.

The report also records the first use of an enforcement vehicle, which it calls the MEV. It says 16 notices were issued by the vehicle in its first few weeks of operation, and that the vehicle was certified in March 2026 by the Vehicle Certification Agency.

Where the £1.2 Million Went and What Was Left

LEZ penalty revenue received in 2025/26 was £1,225,658, according to paragraph 3.5 of the report. Revenue costs in Table 6 were £784,080, which leaves a net surplus of £441,578. The report calls that net allocatable revenue, meaning money the council can allocate to other projects.

The same net figure for 2024/25 was £793,187, so the surplus fell by £351,609, or about 44%. The two years are not like for like. Enforcement began in June 2024, and the first reporting period was shorter than a full financial year.

Table 7 lists where the 2025/26 surplus is going: £100,000 for design work on schemes funded by the visitor levy, £100,000 for street trees, £90,000 for a data analyst post for one year, £43,000 for the Turnhouse Road bus gate, £23,875 for bus congestion analysis and £44,000 for a public transport rolling programme. Those items total £400,875. The report also cites the Trams to Newhaven extension and the City Centre West East Link in its section on wider transport investment.

Across the scheme’s whole life, from 2018/19 to the end of 2025/26, the report puts the cost of proposing, implementing and operating the LEZ at £3,335,082. The report’s own tables contain small mismatches. Table 6 carries a 2024/25 heading above figures that match the 2025/26 totals in paragraphs 3.5 and 3.8, and Table 1 lists 39,486 cases while the text notes that this differs from the 37,092 notices issued.

Fine income is not meant to be the point of the zone. The report links the scheme to air quality, and says the Air Quality Annual Progress Report and the SEPA results are both expected to be presented in November 2026. The Year 2 report itself carries no air quality results.

The DVLA Records Problem Behind the Fines That Never Arrived

The most pointed finding in the report concerns data the council does not hold itself. It says 7.1% of notices could not be issued, with the cause given as missing or inaccurate keeper records held by the DVLA. A notice goes to the registered keeper, so a vehicle with no traceable keeper cannot be charged at all.

The first-period figures reported by STV News were starker. Cases were written off mostly for two reasons: 81% were a case of no trace of the vehicle’s keeper in the DVLA’s data, and 13% were undeliverable mail with incorrect recipient details. STV also reported that over one in three non-compliant and non-exempt vehicles entering the zone in that period could not be charged at all.

The DVLA’s reply put the responsibility back on vehicle owners. A DVLA spokesperson said: “Registered keepers are legally responsible for ensuring the details of their vehicle are up to date and notifying the DVLA of any changes.” The agency also said the council had never informed it of the data problems. Councillor Jenkinson said the issue was not limited to Edinburgh, and added: “I’d also remind all drivers that they have a legal responsibility for ensuring their details are correct and up to date.”

For drivers the practical meaning runs both ways. A missing keeper record can mean a notice never arrives. The same gap can send a notice to the wrong person if a car was sold and the DVLA was not told. As the DVLA puts it, the duty to keep the record current sits with the registered keeper.

What Drivers Using Edinburgh’s Zone Should Do

Check that your vehicle meets the LEZ emission standard before you drive into the zone, using the council’s own guidance. The report shows the council issued 37,092 notices in a single year, and an exemption or a compliant vehicle only helps if the council’s records show it.

Keep your V5C details correct. If you have bought or sold a car recently, confirm the DVLA holds the right keeper. Both the DVLA and the council say that responsibility belongs to the keeper.

Open every penalty letter and read the payment deadline. The report shows that unpaid notices end up with sheriff officers, and that the largest debts run past £20,000.

If you think a notice is wrong, challenge it. Reasons the council reversed notices in the first period included blue badge holders who had not applied for an exemption, wrong DVLA information and roadworks that forced vehicles into the zone. Keep photographs, dates and any diversion evidence with your appeal.

The Year 2 report is due before the Transport and Environment Committee in November 2026. Until the air quality results arrive alongside it, the figures show what the zone costs, what it collects and how much remains unpaid, but not yet whether the air has improved.

Want more car content? Add us as a preferred source on Google to your favourites list for the best automotive news and analysis on the internet.

If you enjoyed this article, be sure to follow us on Microsoft Start.

Sources:

• The City of Edinburgh Council: Low Emission Zone Annual Report (LEZAR) Year 2: April 2025 to March 2026
• STV News: Edinburgh City Council leader branded ‘clueless’ after missing out on £800,000 in LEZ fines
• STV News: DVLA ‘never notified’ about issue that caused £800,000 loss in LEZ fines