RESIDENTS in an Edmonton street were incensed when they woke up this morning to find their cars had been clamped outside their homes.

The leaseholders of Gareth Drive went to bed parked in their usual dedicated parking bays only to find they had been deemed illegally parked the next day.

The bays are reserved for residents parking but, according to them, the security firm responsible for ensuring they are kept this way has changed overnight and nobody told the people who live there.

Teacher Maxine Ormsby, 31, is stuck at home and unable to go to her work without her car.

“I've been parking in that bay since November 2007 when I bought the property and it's always been fine,” she said.

“Apparently they changed the security firm and I was supposed to have a new permit through the post, but I didn't get one.”

“I woke up this morning and it was clamped, I couldn't believe it.

“There's no point me even paying because if they release it I don't have a permit to put on it, and they'll only clamp it again.”

The mother-of-two was able to walk her two toddlers to nursery but came back to try and reason with the clampers.

And she is far from alone, several residents in the street are in the same boat.

While some have stumped up the payment, others are refusing to or unable to and some of these are staging sit ins in their cars in a desperate attempt to stop them being towed away.

The security firm, Parking Control Management UK, is employed by the housing association freeholder, Metropolitan Housing Trust.