Your article on shoppers getting tickets for parking on grass verges in Carden Avenue, Brighton, during the sales (The Argus, December 30) is just another example of Brighton and Hove City Council obtaining money by extortion while ignoring the life-threatening epidemic of double-parking in the city.

I am a firefighter at Preston Circus fire station and our access around some parts of the city is extremely difficult and sometimes impossible.

This could have devastating consequences in an emergency situation yet the council does not appear to be bothered to tow double-parked cars away, preferring to target motorists who park on verges, which, I acknowledge, is wrong but not necessarily a danger to the public.

One day there will be an incident we are unable to get to and, when someone dies because of this, the council will shoulder its share of the blame along with the selfish people whose double-parked cars stopped us doing our job.

-MT Powell, Peacehaven