Fly-tipping claim is given brush-off

Stirling Council’s environment convener has rubbished claims that fly-tipping will increase under the plans to reduce the frequency of general waste collections.

Jim Thomson said there was“absolutely no reason” to conclude that decreasing the amount of general waste taken to landfill would result in an increase in fly-tipping.

At recent full council meeting, replying to a question from Bridge of Allan Tory councillor Douglas Dodds, Councillor Thomson said there had been 292 reports of fly-tipping received since the beginning of lockdown on March 23, but that officers would continue to patrol and monitor affected areas and take enforcement action against those responsible.

The administration said work would be undertaken to“educate”the public through awareness campaigns as well as enforcement - including deployment of mobile CCTV if necessary to tackle fly-tipping.

But a Freedom of

Information request by Dunblane and Bridge of Allan Tory councillor Alastair Majury revealed there are currently no redeployable camera locations approved for monitoring fly-tipping and only two‘environmental crime’sites have been proposed as future locations for consideration for camera deployment – one in Bridge of Allan and the other in Stirling.

Councillor Majury added: “The council cannot enforce the current problems there are with fly-tipping let alone any future incidents when their cuts to collections and charges are imposed. The suggestion by SNP and Labour councillors that they will solve this problem by sticking up a few CCTV cameras is laughable.”

Environment and housing convener Councillor Jim Thomson responded:“The Tories have purposefully picked the period over lockdown to talk about fly-tipping, when they know that we had to shut down recycling centres as did every other local authority in the country, which led to some people behaving irresponsibly.”