English flytipping drops by a fifth

Across England flytipping has fallen by 18.7% in the last year and follows on from a 9% fall last year, according to Government figures released yesterday.

Welcoming the figures the Campaign to Protect Rural England (CPRE) said the improvements were the ‘result of hard work’ by many authorities in prosecuting fly-tippers.

In total, there were 2,460 prosecution actions carried out in 2009-10, of which 97% achieved a successful outcome, according to the (CPRE).

CPRE’s Stop the Drop campaign manager, Samantha Harding, said: “These results show that councils are making real progress in the fight against fly tipping.

“They show that a consistent approach to dealing with fly tipping through prevention and enforcement can lead to real savings to the public purse.

“With councils now facing budget pressures we hope that they will not stop their drive to end fly tipping but step it up as a way to cut costs in the long run.

“But the statistics only deal with fly-tipping on public land. The £45.8 million bill for dealing with fly-tipping would be significantly higher if you added the costs incurred by farmers and other private landowners who have to clear up fly-tipping at their own expense.”

Luke Walsh