Last week the Evening Advertiser told how David Taylor, the holder of a carer of the year award, had his car clamped while he was collecting his severely disabled sister-in-law. The managers of the South Marston Industrial Estate, who employ a clamping firm to deter illegal parkers, are investigating whether the clamper should have used more discretion. But are clamps a way to deter rogue parkers or are they a tool of harassment? Reporter BARRIE HUDSON investigates.

THE horror stories are legion. The RAC, Britain's most venerable motoring organisation, recently carried out nationwide research to discover Britain's worst clamping incidents with a view to handing out a Dick Turpin Award for "highway robbery".

The RAC has no grievance against legitimate firms, but believe the industry is infested with cowboys, whose activities it refers to as legalise mugging.

Examples found included:

Clamped drivers being threatened with large dogs in order to make them pay a release fee.

A clamper in Yorkshire who immobilised a car while the driver was asleep inside.

A group of elderly women being forced to pay a clamp removal charge in Marks and Spencer vouchers.

A heavily pregnant woman being forced to walk more than two miles with her young child to a cashpoint - and then back again - to obtain a removal fee.

Staff at a firm in North West London have been reported for telling members of the public that they are allowed to park on the site, but then immediately clamp them if they do.

A woman reported a company who operate in the Cardiff area. They tried to tow a vehicle away when a young child was in the rear seat. A disabled woman was forced to pay £95 to the same company for parking outside a charity shop, where she was deliver- ing some items.

A man from the West Mid-lands nominated a firm in Black-pool. He was forced to pay £250 to have the clamp removed despite parking on the land for a few seconds

A man who broke down on a busy road pulled into the car park at a local pub. He went to find a phone box so that he could call out the RAC, leaving his 82-year-old disabled wife in the vehicle. Clampers appeared immediately and demanded that the woman move the car. As she was unable to do this because of her disability, they clamped the vehicle and demanded £80 for the clamp's removal.

Apart from the cases unearthed by the RAC, there have been reports of clampers demanding sex from female motorists in lieu of payment, and of clampers threatening violence against motorists who objected.

There have also been allegations of clampers having clamped vehicles towed away to private yards and then charging steep fees for their storage and eventual release, on top of the clamp release fee.

In some cases, drivers of luxury vehicles taken in this way have claimed they paid their fees only to discover that their cars had been driven for several hundred miles, sometimes being damaged in the process.

The RAC award went to the clamper who immobilised a car with the driver asleep inside.

Edmund King, Executive Director of the RAC Founda-tion, said: "Cowboy clampers have been getting away with legalised mugging for too long.

"There is huge concern amongst many motorists who feel they have no rights and no alternative but to pay large sums of money when they have often parked quite innocently."

Those who are concerned about cowboy clampers point out that they often operate from PO Boxes, leave only mobile telephones and charge exorbitant release fees sometimes amounting to hundreds of pounds.

As with so many innovations, both good and bad, America was far ahead of Britain when it came to wheel clamping.

Invented in France and known as the French boot, the device was introduced by city officials in Denver, Colorado , in 1953.

It soon came to be known as the Denver boot, and its popularity across the Atlantic is such that there is scarcely a community in the United States whose traffic officials do not have it in their arsenal of weapons to be used against rogue parkers.

Colleges, universities and private firms wanting to protect their sites from unauthorised parkers also use the device.

Barrie Hudson