Councils in England are on course to generate a combined ‘profit’ of £885 million in 2018/19 from their parking operations – a 13% increase year-on-year.

The official figures were supplied to Government by the 354 local authorities (including Transport for London).

They show a 13% rise on the £786m they forecast for the past financial year (2017-18), the final figures for which have yet to be calculated.

However, if previous years are anything to go by then the £885m ‘profit’ in 2018/19 is likely to be a significant underestimate, says the RAC Foundation.

The actual surplus figure for parking operations for 2016-17 was £819m, far ahead of the £747m councils had themselves predicted.

Only 50 of the 354 authorities expect to make a loss from parking.

The figures – analysed for the RAC Foundation by David Leibling – relate to both on- and off-street parking activities.

The council predicting the biggest profit is Westminster in London. It expects to make £78.7 million in 2018-19.

All but two of the 10 councils predicting the largest surpluses are in the capital, the exception being Brighton and Hove ranked seventh (£21m) and Birmingham ranked 10th (£12.3m).

These surpluses do not take into account any capital charges – either for capital expenditure on new car parks or interest and depreciation on existing car parks – that local authorities might incur. Also excluded is any allocation of corporate overheads.