Littering From Vehicles Outside London (Keepers: Civil Penalties) Regulations 2018

Debate between Viscount Simon and Baroness Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville

Thursday 1st February 2018 Lords Chamber

[Viscount Simon (Lab)]

My Lords, I will be brief. In many other countries there is no litter on the ground or the roads at all. How come? Their drivers are encouraged to have litter bins in their cars. Why cannot we do the same?

[Baroness Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville (LD)]

My Lords, I am grateful to the Minister for her introduction to this important piece of legislation. I declare an interest as a district councillor. I was interested in the contributions made by the noble Lord, Lord Marlesford, and the noble Baroness.

We have all seen cars driving past us, or followed cars from which rubbish has been thrown carelessly out of the window. As we have heard, litter is one of the scourges of our throwaway society. When I was growing up, it was very unusual to see the countryside and pavements littered with bottles and packages. Sadly, now it is commonplace. If this issue is not addressed, we will all be knee-deep in litter. As the noble Lord indicated, there appears to be an attitude among some car drivers—but not all—that they do not need to take their rubbish home and dispose of it safely. Winding down the window appears to be a better option for some of them.

In the market town of Yeovil a few years ago on a retail park site, KFC, previously known as Kentucky Fried Chicken, opened a first new outlet. On the day it opened, a free meal was offered to the first batch of customers. The queues of cars to get to the outlet stretched around the site and down to the bypass. I believe that in excess of 6,000 meals were served that day. Sadly, afterwards, the litter from the takeaway meals was strewn for many miles around the town and countryside. The fact that this opening was such a major event in Yeovil says a lot about the level of leisure activities available—but that is another matter.

Fining motorists for discarding their litter from cars is a start to helping to solve this problem. However, it also has to be tackled at source as well. Burger King, McDonald’s and KFC, as well as other outlets of a similar nature, have their part to play: first, in providing incentives and signage, encouraging their customers to dispose of their litter sensibly and with a view to the state of the environment; but also in making their packaging biodegradable, including their drinking cups and straws and the food containers. It will simply not be good enough to say that it is only on “Blue Planet II” that marine life is endangered by plastic. What of the rarely seen hedgehog, the urban and rural fox, and badgers, mice and voles, which are all likely to pick up and try to eat discarded waste that smells so invitingly of food?

This piece of legislation is long overdue. The keeper is responsible for the action of their passengers. It contains exemptions for taxi drivers, who may not be able to control their passengers’ bad habits. The language in the SI makes it very clear what processes will be involved to ensure that those guilty persons are pursued and fined. There are appeal mechanisms and adjudicators.

My concern is that the enforcement falls back on the “litter authority”. As usual, this is a district council, or a county council where there is no district council, and applies only to England and the Council of the Isles of Scilly, as the Minister said. The good point about collecting the fines is that they may be kept by the collecting authority for execution of its duties under the Clean Neighbourhoods and Environment Act of 2005. The number of reasons that the recipient of fines can give as an excuse for not paying the fine are extensive and lean overly towards the offender. I am concerned that many will be able to wriggle out of paying.

I hope that the fines imposed and collected will recompense the local authorities for the work involved. This should send a big message to the public that the country is no longer prepared to accept such loutish behaviour from car drivers and their passengers. I fully support the SI.