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

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps her Department is taking to tackle fly tipping in Bosworth constituency.

Fly-tipping is an unacceptable blight on local communities, wherever it occurs, and a crime that the Government is committed to tackling. In recent years we have bolstered local authorities’ powers to tackle fly-tipping.

Local authorities, such as Hinckley and Bosworth Borough Council, have a range of powers available to tackle fly-tipping. This includes the power to take those accused of fly-tipping to court. If a fly-tipper is convicted in a Magistrates’ Court, the offence is punishable by a fine of up to £50,000 or 12 months’ imprisonment. If they are convicted in a Crown Court, the offence can attract an unlimited fine and up to five years’ imprisonment.

We have cracked down on offenders by working with the Sentencing Council to strengthen the guidance for environmental offences. We will keep this guidance under review as we deliver on our manifesto commitment to secure tougher penalties. We will continue to work with magistrates and the Judicial Office to ensure magistrates are effectively trained in the use of the guidance and are aware of the prevalence of waste crime and the significance of its impact on local communities. This will help to ensure that fly-tippers receive appropriate sentences for the offence they have committed.

Local authorities have powers to search and seize vehicles of suspected fly-tippers, and the power to issue fixed penalty notices of up to £400 for fly-tipping offences and for those who breach their duty of care by passing their waste to a fly-tipper. In August 2019 we published publicity materials aimed at helping householders better understand their responsibilities under the waste duty of care. The materials have been provided to the Local Government Association to circulate to local authorities and published on the National Fly-Tipping Prevention Group’s website.

Powers to tackle fly-tipping are also being enhanced through the newly introduced Environment Bill, in particular through amendments to the powers to search for and seize evidence, as well as amendments to the powers of entry in the Environment Act 1995, to make it easier for enforcing authorities to use them. In addition to the measures in the Environment Bill, Defra is developing proposals to fundamentally reform the waste carrier, broker, dealer regime and introduce electronic waste tracking which will ensure those transporting waste can be better regulated, and that we are able to track waste through the system at all points.

Defra is also developing a fly-tipping toolkit, which will be a web-based tool to help local authorities and others work in partnership to tackle fly-tipping. It will cover the use of new technology to report fly-tipping, the presentation of cases to court, the sharing of intelligence within and between partnerships and will promote the duty of care to individuals and businesses.