Rubbish bag dumped every three minutes
COUNCILS are having to deal with black bag fly-tipping every three minutes as rubbish collection restrictions bite.
In the past five years there has been a 16 per cent rise in flytipping reports logged by local authorities, where the dumped rubbish is normal black-bagged household waste.
Last year saw 190,258 incidents recorded – more than 3,600 every week – making up almost one-fifth of all fly-tipping.
Figures also revealed 26 people were jailed for the offence while 2,052 individuals were issued with £1.1million worth of fines.
But the Local Government Association wants tougher penalties and more funds for councils, which are being left with total weekly clear-up costs of up to £1million a week.
Spokesman David Renard said: “We want to work with the Government on reviewing sentencing guidelines, so offenders are given bigger fines for more serious offences, and to ensure councils have the funding needed to investigate incidents.”
It is thought that some of the tally may come from householders who have forgotten to leave their rubbish out and then been left with possibly a two-week pile of waste before the binmen return.
In other cases, it can be that householders are allowed to fill up just one wheelie-bin and so then dump any overflow rubbish by the side of the street – hoping the council will clear it away.
The majority of fly-tipping incidents see rubbish just dumped by the side of the road although the statistics show that some is left on farmland and railway lines.
In recent years the collection of household rubbish has become increasingly complex as councils attempt to recycle more.
Collections of normal household waste have also been reduced in many areas and now the vast majority of councils have fortnightly collections, with some collecting even less frequently.
Councils say they have brought in recycling schemes to compensate for fewer rubbish collections as the nation attempted to reach an EU target of 50 per cent household rubbish recycling by 2020.
In 2018-19 the authorities that dealt with the most cases of flytipping of household waste in black bin bags were Haringey and Hounslow in London, which dealt with 11,192 and 5,463 incidents respectively.
Outside London, Milton Keynes was the worst offender (5,151) followed by Plymouth (4,887) and Birmingham (4,697).
The news comes as it was suggested there were only four years left before landfill sites across England were full to capacity.