Flytipping

• There were 39,270 Local Authority recorded incidents in 2009/2010 compared to 45,419 incidents reported by the region's local authorities in 2007/2008.  A reduction of over 6 thousand incidents in the last 3 years.

• Flytipping incidents recorded by Local Authorities in the region accounted for 4% of that in England.

• Prosecution actions fell slightly to 93  from 101 in 2008/2009.  The majority (54%) of actions ended in fines. 

• Household waste remains the waste that is flytipped most often.  60% of all fly tipping in the region can be attributed to household waste; there has not been any noticeable improvement in household waste 'dumping' over last years' figures. 

• The most common size of fly-tips (32%) occurred within the car boot load or less category followed by small van load (31%) and single item (17%).

• At a local authority level, the highest total number of reported fly tipping incidents occurred in the City of Bristol, with 7,112 incidents, a jump of nearly 30% and accounting for 18% of the regions’ incidents.

• Plymouth City Council’s record of flytipping incidents, has once again fallen to 4694 incidents.  In 2007/2008 the City recorded over 8000 incidents.  

Fly-tipping is the illegal dumping of waste it is a crime in law, and also socially unacceptable in today’s society.

All kinds of waste are fly-tipped, the most common being household waste. Other wastes that are fly-tipped include appliances like fridge's and washing machines, (2,142 ‘white goods’ incidents in 2008/2009), waste from building and demolition work (2,649 in 2008/2009), animal carcasses (882 incidents in 2008/2009), vehicle parts and tyres (2,707 in 2008/2009). Hazardous wastes such as oil, asbestos sheeting and chemicals are also dumped illegally and can result in serious toxic pollution.

Over the last few years, the measurement and scale of the extent of fly tipping, or illegal waste disposal, in England has improved following the release and use of Section 55(5) of the Anti-Social Behaviour Act 2003. This Act allowed Defra to require waste collection authorities and the Environment Agency to submit regular data on the types and quantities of fly-tipping with which they deal, now giving us an improved evidence base, enabling Authorities to target areas of concern.

Flycapture is a web-based database of fly tipping incidents that went live in April 2004. It contains information on fly tipping incidents, action taken and a vehicle registration hot-list that is encouraging joint working between authorities. The database is enabling both central and local government to demonstrate the true nature and scale of fly tipping. This data gathering methodology and system is helping to develop more effective, targeted evidence based policies and strategies.

Local authorities are continuing to develop and strengthen their capacity to take the appropriate enforcement action against anti-social fly-tippers.

National perspective

Nearly 947,000 flytipping incidents were reported by local authorities in England between April 2009 and March 2010, an 18.7%  reduction from 2008/2009.  However, it must be noted that changes in reporting practices can effect the overall figures.

• 49% of all fly-tips cleared by local authorities occurred on the highway.
• 58% of all fly-tips cleared by local authorities were recorded as being in the car boot load or less, or the small van load categories.
• 63% of fly-tips dealt with by local authorities involved household waste.

Nationally the estimated cost of clearance of illegally dumped waste reported by local authorities in this period was £45.8 million. 2,460 prosecutions were carried out in 2009/10, of which 97% achieved a successful outcome.

The role of the Environment Agency

The Environment Agency (EA) has a very important role in dealing with fly-tipping, dealing mainly with the larger illegal dumping incidents – termed as 'Big, Bad and Nasty'.  Most of these illegal dumps are bigger than a ‘tipper load’.

Incidents involving organised crime and drummed hazardous waste can involve multiple incidents less than a tipper load in size. The EA also submits data to the Flycapture database.

 The Environment Agency dealt with;

•  a total of 1047 illegal waste dumping incidents in 2009/10

• took 165 prosecutions forward in relation to illegal waste activities, resulting in over £ 500,000 in fines. 

Offenders found guilty of waste crime offences taken by the Environment Agency could receive a range of penalties, from custodial sentences, curfew orders and in some cases had their assets seized. 

South West

Local Authorities in the South West report that they had dealt with 39,270 incidents of fly-tipping, an 14% decrease from 2009/10.  Please note that changes in reporting practices can effect the overall figures.

• 59% (23,112) of all recorded fly-tips occurred on the highway. 
• 63% (25,219) of all fly-tips were recorded as being in the car boot or small van load size categories. 
• 60% (23,698)of fly-tips dealt with by local authorities involved household waste (recorded under the two Flycapture categories of household black bags and other household waste).

The most common size of fly-tips (32%) occurred within the car boot load or less category followed by small van load (31%) and single item (17%), transit van loads accounted for nearly 9%, single black bags 8%, tipper lorry loads 2%, less than 1% accounted for significant multi load incidents.

 93 prosecutions were carried out in 2009/10, of which;over half  resulted in a fine, 15 were given a custodial sentence, 13 had other successful 6 were given a absolute / conditional discharge. 9 cases were lost. 

• Full results for each local authority in England and summary regional reports is available on the Defra website.

• The Environment Agency also has detailed information on flytipping incidents.

• For more information at a local level on waste and other topics, please see the Local Profiles