ERROR RG P4 18.2.1998 In a story in The Royal Gazette last Friday headlined Traffic Wardens Get Stamp of Approval it may have been implied that attorney Mr. Phil Perrinchief condoned the deliberate obstruction of traffic wardens in their duty.

We wish to stress that Mr. Perinchief has never expressed these views to this newspaper and we apologise for any misunderstanding that might have been caused.

Corporation of Hamilton Secretary Roger Sherratt has come out in support of the city's traffic wardens.

An he has also dismissed claims by one lawyer that tickets issued by wardens are not valid.

Mr. Sherratt was responding to an article in Tuesday's Royal Gazette in which attorney Phil Perinchief questioned the legality of tickets because they had not been rubber stamped by Parliament.

But he gave assurances that motorists could not expect to get off the hook because of administrative errors.

"The Corporation has been aware that there has been technical problems with tickets where summonses were issued more than six months after the ticket,'' he said.

"We also understand that there was a minor technical problem with the tickets themselves this week. That has now been resolved and as far as the traffic wardens are concerned they are now back in action and issuing tickets and they are valid.

"We don't want members of the public to think they can get away with not paying tickets for the next few days.

"I think people were thinking that, if they got a ticket they would be able to get away with it by just not paying for it for six months. I understand that this is going to be addressed by Parliament very shortly.

"The new tickets are computer generated and the court is dealing with them faster so, while there may be arguments about old tickets there's no question about new tickets.

"The other area of concern is the attitude of some people when they address traffic wardens.

"If there are any complaints against a traffic warden there is a disciplinary procedure and they can be investigated. But when someone abuses a traffic warden they think they can get away with it. Traffic wardens work for the Government but we strongly support them.'' Referring to Mr. Perinchief's claims Mr. Sherratt said: "The Police have a zero tolerance policy toward anyone who abuses traffic wardens and we support this.''