Traders have urged a council to help business users of green vehicles. Residents in Brighton and Hove can get a 50% discount on parking permit fees if they use a low emission vehicle.

The discount applies to vehicles that have been registered after 2001 and which have CO2 emissions of no more than 120g/km. But business users of the same type of vehicles are not eligible for cheaper rates.

In April the council pushed parking prices up by up to 100% in an effort to cut congestion and pollution across the city.

Racheal Hughes, boss at the Green Mop environmental cleaning company in Coleridge Street, Hove, said if the price hikes are about lowering pollution in Brighton and Hove, then discounts for greener vehicles are an essential part of the plan.

She said: “I would encourage the council to look at this urgently or risk further accusations of just using parking as a way of raising substantial revenue, rather than as part of a plan to reduce unnecessary vehicle use and cut pollution.

“As a ‘green’ business, Green Mop makes every effort to be as efficient as possible with our use of vehicles, but they are an essential tool to move supplies around the city and keep our workers working.

“Business parking permits have almost doubled in cost without any proper explanation of how this policy helps the city, or the businesses trying to battle the odds, or the people looking to those businesses to provide them with jobs.

“The very least I would expect is that the Green administration offers the same discount to businesses with low emissions vehicles as it does to residents.” Entrepreneur Elliott Raggio, boss at the On Tap Group and spokesman for the Traders Need Transport lobby group, said: “Once again the council is driven by political angles. “When will they realise that if they lower business overheads they will stimulate the local economy? It is not a difficult idea to understand.”

A spokesman for Brighton and Hove City Council said: “As things stand the discount only applies to resident permits. “It’s something that the chair of our transport committee, Councillor Ian Davey , is aware of and intends to look at as part of future parking fees and tariffs discussions. I can’t give a timescale at this stage.”