[Misc] Fly tipping - it's rubbish

[Eric the meek]

When I take Mrs ETM out on a drive into the lovely English countryside, I expect to see things like trees, lambs, fields, hedges, rivers etc.

What I don't expect or want to see, is a pile of rubbish dumped by some **** because he wants to make a few more quid on a job by not paying the fee for trade waste at the local council tip.
I'm no eco-warrior, but each time I go anywhere out of Brighton, I see fly-tipping. It's a blot on the landscape. Either the charges to use the local tip are too high, the fines for fly-tipping are too low, or attitudes of both tradesmen and customers need to change.

What's the answer?

1. Make it free for the tradesmen? Take away the incentive to dump the rubbish in the country, because it won't cost them anything to dump it at the tip? There is a cost anyway of course. This would transfer the cost from the business to the council taxpayer. Not ideal.
2. Make the fines for fly-tipping much more severe, so that the individual dumping is risking his livelihood? I'm talking a steeply escalating scale of fines for repeat offenders, confiscation of vehicles etc.
3. Something else? Re-use of all waste materials somehow? Burial of all waste material on site? Ok, that's probably a pipe-dream.

I don't know which, if any, of the above would work. But something needs to change.

 

[Herr Tubthumper]

When I take Mrs ETM out on a drive into the lovely English countryside, I expect to see things like trees, lambs, fields, hedges, rivers etc.

What I don't expect or want to see, is a pile of rubbish dumped by some **** because he wants to make a few more quid on a job by not paying the fee for trade waste at the local council tip.
I'm no eco-warrior, but each time I go anywhere out of Brighton, I see fly-tipping. It's a blot on the landscape. Either the charges to use the local tip are too high, the fines for fly-tipping are too low, or attitudes of both tradesmen and customers need to change.

What's the answer?

1. Make it free for the tradesmen? Take away the incentive to dump the rubbish in the country, because it won't cost them anything to dump it at the tip? There is a cost anyway of course. This would transfer the cost from the business to the council taxpayer. Not ideal.
2. Make the fines for fly-tipping much more severe, so that the individual dumping is risking his livelihood? I'm talking a steeply escalating scale of fines for repeat offenders, confiscation of vehicles etc.
3. Something else? Re-use of all waste materials somehow? Burial of all waste material on site? Ok, that's probably a pipe-dream.

I don't know which, if any, of the above would work. But something needs to change.

Make it free at the council tip. The taxpayer will have to shoulder the cost, but they already do when the council have to scoop up the crap dumped in the countryside

 

[dazzer6666]

Recurring theme on here from time to time…….absolutely boils my piss. Saw a big pile of tyres that had been dumped in a layby on a quiet lane when I was out running this morning. On my usual routes there are 3 or 4 places that are regularly used - leads me to think it might be a relatively small number of offenders continually doing it. I reported one recently (easy to do on the council website) after I caught him in the act but in reality your chances of getting caught are quite slim I guess so the penalties are a bit of a moot point. Also,Commercials are charged at the tip so there’s an incentive to use the roadside and our local tip is restricted to West Sussex residents (even though we’re on the border) and you have to have ID with you - can imagine someone loading up their car/van and being turned away is quite likely to dump it somewhere quiet on the way home. There’s often an enormous queue at weekends as well which may lead to a similar outcome.

Make the tips free and more accessible (longer opening hours) and suspect the problem would be largely solved.

We also have a persistent and regular issue on one of our club fishing waters - cable-strippers (probably stolen) dumping the plastic sheaths off a bridge into our weirpool. Incredibly frustrating and very difficult to remove in deep, fast-flowing water

 

[Rowdey]

When I take Mrs ETM out on a drive into the lovely English countryside, I expect to see things like trees, lambs, fields, hedges, rivers etc.

What I don't expect or want to see, is a pile of rubbish dumped by some **** because he wants to make a few more quid on a job by not paying the fee for trade waste at the local council tip.
I'm no eco-warrior, but each time I go anywhere out of Brighton, I see fly-tipping. It's a blot on the landscape. Either the charges to use the local tip are too high, the fines for fly-tipping are too low, or attitudes of both tradesmen and customers need to change.

What's the answer?

1. Make it free for the tradesmen? Take away the incentive to dump the rubbish in the country, because it won't cost them anything to dump it at the tip? There is a cost anyway of course. This would transfer the cost from the business to the council taxpayer. Not ideal.
2. Make the fines for fly-tipping much more severe, so that the individual dumping is risking his livelihood? I'm talking a steeply escalating scale of fines for repeat offenders, confiscation of vehicles etc.
3. Something else? Re-use of all waste materials somehow? Burial of all waste material on site? Ok, that's probably a pipe-dream.

I don't know which, if any, of the above would work. But something needs to change.

Point of note here.. Your making this very much a 'tradesmen' led issue.. Now, it will be some, but definatley all not tradesmen who do this..
I've had clients baulk at 'refuse collection costs' and decide to 'get there own guy in' and 4 days later get a knock from Wandsworth Council saying 'we've found your waste on Tooting Common..' He was a grade A tosspot banker who treated every trade in his house refurb, a 'deal to be re-negotiated on'..

 

[Weststander]

Make it free at the council tip. The taxpayer will have to shoulder the cost, but they already do when the council have to scoop up the crap dumped in the countryside

Simply this, it would make a big difference.

There would still be fly tipping, there are plenty of lazy scum in this country without care for community. 6 months minimum imprisonment if caught. It's not a victimless crime - plastics break up and reach water courses or the sea eventually, farmers have to deal with the cost, animals are harmed by some waste.

 

[Greavsey]

At our local tip (Maresfield), there is a charge now for the general public to tip hardcore/soil at £4 per rubble bag. This just seems insane and surely only going to promote fly tipping.

 

[Eric the meek]

Simply this, it would make a big difference.

There would still be fly tipping, there are plenty of lazy scum in this country without care for community. 6 months minimum imprisonment if caught. It's not a victimless crime - plastics break up and reach water courses or the sea eventually, farmers have to deal with the cost, animals are harmed by some waste.

It must be worth a decent trial period of several years to see if it genuinely makes the difference. I suspect you are right, in that it would make a big difference, but not eradicate the problem completely.

The repeat offenders that @dazzer6666 suspects are the ones to focus on. Queues at waste facilities = time = cost for tradesmen as well, so his suggestion to widen the opening times would help, or make say from 4pm, trade waste only.

 

[dazzer6666]

It must be worth a decent trial period of several years to see if it genuinely makes the difference. I suspect you are right, in that it would make a big difference, but not eradicate the problem completely.

The repeat offenders that @dazzer6666 suspects are the ones to focus on. Queues at waste facilities = time = cost for tradesmen as well, so his suggestion to widen the opening times would help, or make say from 4pm, trade waste only.

Great idea……

 

[carlzeiss]

That's the way to do it

 

[rippleman]

Recurring theme on here from time to time…….absolutely boils my piss. Saw a big pile of tyres that had been dumped in a layby on a quiet lane when I was out running this morning. On my usual routes there are 3 or 4 places that are regularly used - leads me to think it might be a relatively small number of offenders continually doing it. I reported one recently (easy to do on the council website) after I caught him in the act but in reality your chances of getting caught are quite slim I guess so the penalties are a bit of a moot point. Also,Commercials are charged at the tip so there’s an incentive to use the roadside and our local tip is restricted to West Sussex residents (even though we’re on the border) and you have to have ID with you - can imagine someone loading up their car/van and being turned away is quite likely to dump it somewhere quiet on the way home. There’s often an enormous queue at weekends as well which may lead to a similar outcome.

Make the tips free and more accessible (longer opening hours) and suspect the problem would be largely solved.

We also have a persistent and regular issue on one of our club fishing waters - cable-strippers (probably stolen) dumping the plastic sheaths off a bridge into our weirpool. Incredibly frustrating and very difficult to remove in deep, fast-flowing water

This is a good idea. The combination of a reduction in Council Tip opening hours and charges for trade waste has resulted in more fly tipping. Apparently Worthing Council engaged a couple of consultants to come up with an explanation for an increase in the fly-tipping!

But it isn't only building trade waste. I regularly speak with one of Worthings unsung heroes - a street cleaner - who has to deal with dumped waste from takeaways that they just dump because they don't want to pay for commercial waste collections, and domestic dumping of mattresses, old/broken appliances, carpets etc dumped in alleyways in town. There is a lack of will, so I am told, to investigate who is dumping the waste without which, there isn't anybody to fine.

 

[dazzer6666]

This is a good idea. The combination of a reduction in Council Tip opening hours and charges for trade waste has resulted in more fly tipping. Apparently Worthing Council engaged a couple of consultants to come up with an explanation for an increase in the fly-tipping!

But it isn't only building trade waste. I regularly speak with one of Worthings unsung heroes - a street cleaner - who has to deal with dumped waste from takeaways that they just dump because they don't want to pay for commercial waste collections, and domestic dumping of mattresses, old/broken appliances, carpets etc dumped in alleyways in town. There is a lack of will, so I am told, to investigate who is dumping the waste without which, there isn't anybody to fine.

Yep……a lot of what I see on the lanes is definitely household stuff. Broken up furniture, mattresses, appliances, old toys, garden waste etc etc. Doubt investigation would be cost effective - suspect most of it contains no obvious trace of the offender.

Our local tip is really well organised, with decent staff and easily accessible - which makes people doing this stuff even more contemptible imo.

 

[Justice]

Point of note here.. Your making this very much a 'tradesmen' led issue.. Now, it will be some, but definatley all not tradesmen who do this..
I've had clients baulk at 'refuse collection costs' and decide to 'get there own guy in' and 4 days later get a knock from Wandsworth Council saying 'we've found your waste on Tooting Common..' He was a grade A tosspot banker who treated every trade in his house refurb, a 'deal to be re-negotiated on'..

This, a job I’m about to start I’ve had to price in 36 skips and I really don’t have the time to empty the van fill it with rubbish drive out to the sticks and dump it.
Proper tradesman don’t do this and don’t need to, we all know who the main culprits are.

 

[fly high]

It's not just van loads of waste which defaced the countryside, the amount of rubbish people throw out of their cars is disgusting, take it home and put it in your bin. Litter pickers cleaned up along a section of the A22 three weekends running, no sooner had they finished than rubbish reappeared. Once I was waiting to cross the road to take the dogs for a walk when a van drove past and the driver threw an empty beer bottle out his window, glass shattered across the road, complete moron.

 

[Papak]

Point of note here.. Your making this very much a 'tradesmen' led issue.. Now, it will be some, but definatley all not tradesmen who do this..
I've had clients baulk at 'refuse collection costs' and decide to 'get there own guy in' and 4 days later get a knock from Wandsworth Council saying 'we've found your waste on Tooting Common..' He was a grade A tosspot banker who treated every trade in his house refurb, a 'deal to be re-negotiated on'..

I think you missed the point, the waste being predominantly trade waste points to tradesmen doing the fly tipping, not that all tradesmen are fly tipping.

 

[Papak]

It's not just van loads of waste which defaced the countryside, the amount of rubbish people throw out of their cars is disgusting, take it home and put it in your bin. Litter pickers cleaned up along a section of the A22 three weekends running, no sooner had they finished than rubbish reappeared. Once I was waiting to cross the road to take the dogs for a walk when a van drove past and the driver threw an empty beer bottle out his window, glass shattered across the road, complete moron.

Next time you stop at a roundabout on a main road look and see how much crap is in the verge.

The central reservation was mown last year on the A264 between Horsham and Crawley and all it did was make tonnes of rubbish highly visible.

 

[dazzer6666]

I think you missed the point, the waste being predominantly trade waste points to tradesmen doing the fly tipping, not that all tradesmen are fly tipping.

In my experience it's not predominantly trade - some, yes, but at least equal amounts of someones room renovation/new fridge/mattress/bedroom furniture etc

 

[dazzer6666]

Next time you stop at a roundabout on a main road and see how much crap is in the verge.

The central reservation was mown last year on the A264 between Horsham and Crawley and all it did was make tonnes of rubbish highly visible.

The A27 sliproad onto the the A23 northbound (all the way down the hill) is particularly bad

 

[Weststander]

Yep……a lot of what I see on the lanes is definitely household stuff. Broken up furniture, mattresses, appliances, old toys, garden waste etc etc. Doubt investigation would be cost effective - suspect most of it contains no obvious trace of the offender.

Our local tip is really well organised, with decent staff and easily accessible - which makes people doing this stuff even more contemptible imo.

Hidden CCTV at regular dumping places has caught quite a few offenders in Kent, local TV news often covers this. Perpetrators are fined heavily, I think there've been prison sentences too.

 

[MJsGhost]

One thing I would say is that enforcement isn't completely useless.
My mother in law got her collar felt by the old bill as someone found an envelope addressed to her in a load of fly-tipped rubbish.
It turned out that some of her domestic rubbish got mixed in with bits of an outbuilding she had paid to have knocked down and cleared away, which was subsequently fly-tipped. I don't know what the punishment was, but I do know that the 'builders' were prosecuted.
This was in Brighton.

I'm all for escalating fines / punishments, ending just short of the gallows.

Given the lack of funding, I'm not sure what services people would want to see cut in order to pay for tips that are free at point of use (it would be interesting to see if the cost saved by not having to clear up after the fly-tippers and not having the police investigate, court time etc etc would cover it)

 

[Weststander]

The A27 sliproad onto the the A23 northbound (all the way down the hill) is particularly bad

Is that on the south or north side of the dual carriageway?