Fly-tipping

(asked on 20th January 2020) - View Source

Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what (a) guidance and (b) support her Department provides to local authorities to help tackle with fly-tipping.


Answered by
Rebecca Pow Portrait
Rebecca Pow
Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
This question was answered on 23rd January 2020

Tackling fly-tipping is a Government priority. It blights local communities and the environment wherever it occurs and we are committed to tackling fly-tipping.

Guidance for local authorities can be found on the Gov.uk website. It includes information and links on local authority responsibilities, investigations, penalties and prosecutions, claiming costs, keeping records and preventing fly-tipping. The guidance can be found here: https://www.gov.uk/guidance/fly-tipping-council-responsibilities

In August 2019 we published a research project on public awareness of and adherence to the household waste duty of care. We also published related publicity materials that have been provided to the Local Government Association to circulate to local authorities. They are available on the National Fly-Tipping Prevention Group’s (NFTPG) website: http://www.tacklingflytipping.com

With the support of local authorities, the NFTPG, chaired by Defra, has published a Fly-tipping Partnership Framework outlining best practice for the prevention, reporting, investigation and clearance of fly-tipping. It has also published a series of fly-tipping prevention guides for householders, businesses and landowners.

We have also committed to the development of a fly-tipping toolkit, hosted by the NFTPG. This will be a web-based tool to help local authorities and others work in partnership to tackle fly-tipping. It will cover, for example, the use of new technology to report fly-tipping, sharing of intelligence within and between partnerships, dealing with unauthorised encampments and promoting the duty of care to individuals and businesses.

In addition to the above, we have given local authorities a range of powers available to tackle fly-tipping. These include the power to issue fixed penalty notices (FPNs) of up to £400 for fly-tipping offences, including to those caught fly-tipping and householders who pass their waste to a fly-tipper. Local authorities also have enhanced powers to search and seize vehicles of suspected fly-tippers. Powers to issue FPNs provide local authorities with an efficient mechanism to hold fly-tipping perpetrators to account without having to go to court, which can be a time consuming, resource-intensive and expensive process. Additionally, the ability to issue FPNs can deter potential fly-tippers from fly-tipping in the first place.

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