Asked by: Jim Shannon (Democratic Unionist Party - Strangford)
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 provide (a) support and (b) guidance to local councils on using fixed penalty notices for litter enforcement.
Answered by Rebecca Pow - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The Prime Minister’s Anti-Social Behaviour Action Plan made clear that we want to see councils use fixed penalties for environmental crimes, including littering, much more. It also set out steps we would take to help and encourage councils to do this. This includes ringfencing the income from litter and fly-tipping penalties for enforcement and clean-up activity, which we are currently consulting key stakeholders on.
We have also published improved guidance to councils and others on the effective use of their fixed penalty powers for littering and related offences. The guidance outlines that enforcement action should be proportionate and should only be taken when it is in the public interest to do so. We have committed to putting this guidance on a statutory footing, giving those to which it applies a clear and explicit duty to have regard to it when exercising their enforcement functions.
We are currently undertaking a research project which considers the effectiveness of the different enforcement options available to local authorities and the barriers they face in using these. This will inform future policy development in this area.
Asked by: Bim Afolami (Conservative - Hitchin and Harpenden)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps she is taking to improve the management of fly tipping in Hertfordshire.
Answered by Rebecca Pow - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The role of central Government in tackling fly-tipping is to support local action. Across two rounds of our fly-tipping grant scheme, we have now awarded nearly £1.2m to help more than 30 councils purchase equipment to tackle fly-tipping at known hot-spots; recipients include Stevenage Borough Council who received just over £26,000 to install mobile CCTV and signage to deter perpetrators.
The Prime Minister’s Anti-Social Behaviour Action Plan sets out how we will support councils to take tougher action against those who fly-tip. This includes a commitment to significantly raise the upper limit on fixed penalty notices this year, to £1,000 for fly-tipping and £600 for people who give their waste to an unauthorised carrier.
Defra chairs the National Fly-Tipping Prevention Group, through which we work with a wide range of interested parties, including the Hertfordshire Waste Partnership, to promote and disseminate good practice with regards to preventing fly-tipping.
Asked by: Earl Russell (Liberal Democrat - Excepted Hereditary)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask His Majesty's Government what financial resources they are allocating to anti-littering campaigns in England.
Answered by Lord Benyon - Minister of State (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office)
Defra launched the “Keep it, Bin it” anti-litter campaign in 2018 with Keep Britain Tidy to encourage people to dispose of their litter responsibly. Defra spent over £200,000 on scoping, developing and launching the campaign. Since 2019/20, the campaign has been funded by external partners. Keep Britain Tidy have now made the campaign available to local authorities and landowners for local use.
In response to COVID-19, Defra spent just under £100,000 on the development and launch of the 'Respect the Outdoors' campaign which included messaging about littering among other issues. We also contributed £30,000 for Keep Britain Tidy's Love Parks campaign, which encouraged people to treat our parks with respect.
We have previously provided nearly £1million across 44 councils to help them to purchase new bins, in support of targeted interventions to reduce litter. Across the last two years, our fly-tipping grant scheme has awarded nearly £1.2million to help more than 30 councils tackle the dumping of waste at known hot-spots.
We have also used social media to raise awareness of the impact of litter and to encourage individuals to put their rubbish in the bin or to take it home. The cost of these activities cannot be separated. Likewise, spend on Defra staff cannot be disaggregated.
Asked by: Richard Foord (Liberal Democrat - Tiverton and Honiton)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what recent discussions she has had with the National Farmers Union on tackling rural crime.
Answered by Trudy Harrison
Defra Ministers meet regularly with the NFU on a wide range of issues including rural crimes such as fly tipping and livestock worrying.
Asked by: Richard Foord (Liberal Democrat - Tiverton and Honiton)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, when she last met the National Police Chiefs Council to discuss rural crime rates.
Answered by Chris Philp - Minister of State (Home Office)
The Government are committed to driving down rural crime. Whether someone lives in the countryside, a town, or a city, they should have the same peace of mind when going about their daily lives, and they should get the same high-quality service from the police if they fall victim to a crime.
The Home Secretary, Ministers and officials meet with a range of stakeholders on a regular basis to discuss how best to tackle rural crime and are taking important steps to address issues that we know affect rural communities.
The Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act empowers and equips the police and courts with the powers they need to combat hare coursing, and the Government is supporting the Equipment Theft (Prevention) Bill, which aims to prevent the theft of quad bikes and All-Terrain Vehicles. The Government is also providing funding for the National Wildlife Crime Unit and new National Rural Crime Unit, which will support forces nationally in their response to rural crime such as theft of farming construction machinery, livestock theft and rural fly tipping.
Asked by: Richard Foord (Liberal Democrat - Tiverton and Honiton)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, when she last met the Neighbourhood Watch Network to discuss rural crime.
Answered by Chris Philp - Minister of State (Home Office)
The Government are committed to driving down rural crime. Whether someone lives in the countryside, a town, or a city, they should have the same peace of mind when going about their daily lives, and they should get the same high-quality service from the police if they fall victim to a crime.
The Home Secretary, Ministers and officials meet with a range of stakeholders on a regular basis to discuss how best to tackle rural crime and are taking important steps to address issues that we know affect rural communities.
The Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act empowers and equips the police and courts with the powers they need to combat hare coursing, and the Government is supporting the Equipment Theft (Prevention) Bill, which aims to prevent the theft of quad bikes and All-Terrain Vehicles. The Government is also providing funding for the National Wildlife Crime Unit and new National Rural Crime Unit, which will support forces nationally in their response to rural crime such as theft of farming construction machinery, livestock theft and rural fly tipping.
Asked by: Richard Foord (Liberal Democrat - Tiverton and Honiton)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, on what date (a) she or (b) a minister in her Department last met with the National Rural Crime Network to discuss measures to tackle rural crime.
Answered by Chris Philp - Minister of State (Home Office)
The Government are committed to driving down rural crime. Whether someone lives in the countryside, a town, or a city, they should have the same peace of mind when going about their daily lives, and they should get the same high-quality service from the police if they fall victim to a crime.
The Home Secretary, Ministers and officials meet with a range of stakeholders on a regular basis to discuss how best to tackle rural crime and are taking important steps to address issues that we know affect rural communities.
The Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act empowers and equips the police and courts with the powers they need to combat hare coursing, and the Government is supporting the Equipment Theft (Prevention) Bill, which aims to prevent the theft of quad bikes and All-Terrain Vehicles. The Government is also providing funding for the National Wildlife Crime Unit and new National Rural Crime Unit, which will support forces nationally in their response to rural crime such as theft of farming construction machinery, livestock theft and rural fly tipping.
Asked by: Preet Kaur Gill (Labour (Co-op) - Birmingham, Edgbaston)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what recent steps she has taken to help tackle waste crime in Birmingham, Edgbaston constituency.
Answered by Rebecca Pow - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The Government is committed to tackling waste crime, which is a blight on our local communities and the environment and damages legitimate businesses. We have strengthened regulators' powers, are tightening the law and have increased the Environment Agency's budget by £10 million per year to make it harder for rogue operators to find work in the sector and easier for regulators to take action against criminals. We are also providing grants to councils across the country to help them purchase equipment to tackle fly-tipping. Recipients include Birmingham City Council.
Between 2013 and 2023 the Environment Agency stopped 52 illegal sites within the Birmingham area. From April 2022 to March 2023 the Environment Agency dealt with 384 incidents relating to suspected illegal waste sites/activities across the West Midlands. Around 84% of these reports which were substantiated were closed down within 90 days.
In the same year, the Environment Agency closed down 15 illegal waste sites classified as high risk. This protected 20,582 properties (located within 1km of the site) and removed of 148,982 tonnes of waste. Four of these sites were in the Birmingham area.
Asked by: Matt Vickers (Conservative - Stockton South)
Question to the Home Office:
To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps her Department is taking to ensure that police officers are able to tackle antisocial behaviour.
Answered by Chris Philp - Minister of State (Home Office)
On 27 March we published the ASB Action Plan. The ASB Action Plan commits to tackling ASB across five key themes: stronger punishment, making communities safer, building local pride, prevention and early intervention, improving data, reporting and accountability for action.
This plan is backed by £160m of funding. This includes up to £60m to fund an increased police and other uniformed presence to clamp down on anti-social behaviour, targeting hotspots. Initially we will work with 10 police force areas, including Cleveland, but from 2024 will support a hotspot approach across every police force area in England and Wales.
We are also providing up to £50m to support the provision of Immediate Justice, by issuing out of court disposals with conditions to swiftly repair any damage – the aim being for them to start within 48 hours of the offence. This will start in 10 initial trailblazer police force areas, including Cleveland and be rolled out across England and Wales from 2024.
As part of the Action Plan, we are also giving the police and local authorities more tools to tackle the problem – increasing on the spot fines for graffiti and fly tipping, filling empty shops, restoring local parks, and regenerating local green spaces.
Cleveland Police has recruited 267 additional uplift police officers against a total three-year allocation of 239 officers, as at 31 March 2023. Cleveland Police’s funding will be up to £162.1m in 2023/24, an increase of up to £5.1m when compared to 2022/23.
The Office for National Statistics annually publishes anti-social behaviour incidents reported to the police by Police Force Area and no further lower level breakdown is currently available. There are plans to publish new Community Safety Partnership (CSP) breakdowns later this year. The latest available data covering year to March 2022 can be found here: Crime in England and Wales: Police Force Area data tables - Office for National Statistics (ons.gov.uk)
Asked by: Scott Benton (Independent - Blackpool South)
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.
Answered by Rebecca Pow - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The Prime Minister’s Anti-social Behaviour Action Plan sets out how we will support councils to take tougher action against those who fly-tip. This includes raising the upper limit of spot fines for fly-tipping to £1,000; delivering on our manifesto commitment to increase penalties.
We have also awarded councils nearly £1.2 million to purchase equipment to tackle fly-tipping, such as CCTV, and consulted on reforms to how waste is managed to stamp out criminal activity.