A WOMAN has to pay £550 in fines and costs for allowing another driver to use her disabled parking badge to park for free in London .

Karen Heslop, 44, of Hillside, Chester-le-Street, pleaded guilty to the Road Traffic Regulation Act 1984 offence.

Magistrates in Peterlee heard that on 11 occasions between September 2013 and April 2014 fraud investigators saw the same vehicle parked in a restricted area in Fulham.

They never saw a pay and display ticket in the window but the blue badge issued to Karen Heslop by Durham County Council in 2013 was displayed.

Investigators discovered that the vehicle was registered to another woman, from Newcastle, and did that it not have a valid residents’ permit to park in that street.

Blue badges can only be used by the people to whom they are issued.

In mitigation, the court heard that the blue badge had not been obtained from the council by deception.

But the defendant did accept that she had been deceitful in allowing it to be used incorrectly by someone else.

She was fined £200, with £330 costs and a £20 victim surcharge.