New £400 Fines Set To Tackle Blight Of Fly Tipping

Wednesday, 13 July 2016 07:00

Bradford Council’s Executive Committee will be asked to approve the introduction of new powers to allow the Council’s Environmental Enforcement Team to issue Fixed Penalty Notices of up to £400 to tackle small scale fly-tipping.

A report will be discussed at the meeting on 19 July.

The report recommends that the council adopts the maximum fine of £400 with a reduced sum of £300 if the fine is paid within 10 days.

Fly-tipping is a criminal offence and currently the only action the council can take is to prosecute offenders through the courts, where the fine can be up to £50,000 or 12 months in prison (in the Magistrates Court) or an unlimited fine and up to five years in prison (in Crown Court).

Prosecutions can be extremely time consuming and costly for the Council and can take months to get to court. Councils are often unable to recover all of the money it costs to bring the prosecution for smaller scale fly-tipping which tends to get fines of a few hundred pounds.

The new legislation is being introduced nationally as part of changes to the Environmental Protection Act 1990.

The ability to issue fixed penalty notices for small scale, non-hazardous fly-tipping will mean that the council can save time and money in prosecutions.

If the fine is not paid, there is a repeat offence or the fly-tipping is major or contains hazardous waste, the council will still prosecute through the court.

Coun Sarah Ferriby, Bradford Council’s Executive Member for Environment, Sport and Culture, said: "Disposing of waste correctly is everyone’s responsibility and fly-tippers ignore the rules that the rest of us stick to. Fly-tipping blights our district and our communities shouldn’t have to pay the price for their irresponsible behaviour”.

"We and other councils across the country have been calling for this change in legislation. If approved, it will mean that we can deal with fly-tipping offences quicker and save money, so that we can concentrate on bringing to book those who carry out large-scale repeat fly-tipping offenders.”

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