Fly tipping and littering is a scourge on so many towns and cities. Like so much of the anti-social behaviour we encounter, the irresponsible and selfish actions of a few impact on the vast majority of residents who try do the right thing.
The Council understands that most people take pride in the place where they live. We also know that – alongside repairing roads and potholes – the cleanliness of local neighbourhoods always scores very highly as a priority for residents in Reading. That was again the case in this year’s resident’s survey.
Latest available data from DEFRA shows that for the 2023/24 year, local councils in England dealt with 1.15 million fly-tipping incidents, an increase of 6% from the 1.08 million reported the previous year, and that the majority of fly tips involve household waste.
To that end, we are now working towards securing an agreement with an external partner organisation to enforce environmental offences in Reading even more robustly. This would be on a trial basis for a period of a year.
At the moment the Council has small but determined a team of Recycling & Enforcement Officers whose role is to investigate litter, fly-tipping and other waste offences. That can be a time-consuming business, firstly in terms of being able to identify the perpetrators and then following it up with appropriate action. Those same officers also have duties in educating residents and businesses around recycling and appropriate waste management. With the new Government’s introduction of simpler recycling targets on the horizon, this team’s workload is likely to increase significantly.
And that is part of the reason we are looking at this new way of working. Expected to begin later this year, this new partnership arrangement effectively enables us to double the resources set aside for enforcement for fly tipping and littering offences. At a time when resources are stretched, it allows the Council to prioritise this vital area, albeit under a different service model.
The initiative would see a dedicated team of five officers on Reading’s streets, on weekdays initially and eventually moving to seven days a week, including on public holidays, enforcing several environmental offences. Where an offender is identified, appropriate fixed penalty notices (or fines) will be issued. For larger instances of fly tipping, the Council and its partner can opt not to issue a fine and proceed straight to court action.
For enforcement of fly tipping and littering to work of course, there needs to be an effective deterrent. Effective from April 1, we will therefore increase the maximum fixed penalty notices (FPNs) for littering or graffiti to £500 from £80, fly-tipping to £1,000 from £400, and the incorrect disposal of household waste to £600 from £400, with early payment resulting in a reduced level of fine in each instance.
The partnership comes at no cost to the Council. Instead, the enforcement company’s contract paid via a proportion of fixed penalty notices collected. It’s also important to emphasise that the Council retains the right to be able to review individual cases where deemed necessary. It also allows our in-house team to step up efforts to tackle in-depth fly-tipping investigations and educational work around recycling, which has already proven invaluable in driving Reading’s recycling rate to over 50%.
The Council will additionally shortly be looking at a new approach to our free bulky waste service which will focus on communities where we know fly tipping is worst. If you’ve tried to use the prior booking arrangement before, you will know it was significantly over-subscribed and, as a result, left very little resource to adequately address fly tipping problems in communities where it is most prevalent.
Alongside our ongoing record investment in road repairs across Reading this Spring – which will see another 100-plus residential roads and 15 sections of main roads newly resurfaced – and against a backdrop of spending pressures impacting on every local authority, this Council continues to respond to the concerns residents tell us matter to them most. A tougher approach on fly tipping falls into that category.
By Cllr Liz Terry
