Bolton Council is warning residents that anyone caught flytipping or dumping rubbish will face a £400 on-the-spot fine.
Previously, the only way the council could deal with flytipping was to take the offenders to court and if the offender did not turn up to court, the case couldn’t be heard.
Under new regulations introduced in 2016, the council has now introduced a fixed penalty notice of £400 for flytipping. If the person fined refuses to pay and it progresses to court, the case can be heard in their absence. From now onwards, enforcement officers will be handing out these new fines to anyone involved in illegally dumping waste.
Cases of large scale flytipping, or which involve hazardous waste will continue to be prosecuted through the courts, as well as repeat offenders in flytipping, where culprits face fines of up to £50,000 or a year’s jail if convicted by magistrates.
The council has also invested in two mobile lamppost mounted cameras, to help in the fight against illegal tipping. These will be positioned in known hotspots and will assist the council in identifying and tracking down flytippers, both in daylight and in the dark. Officers will also be provided with bodycams, which can record conversations with potential offenders, in order to assist in providing evidence for the issuing of fixed penalty notices and any subsequent court cases.
The council also approved measures to crack down on local businesses who fail to arrange for correct disposal of their waste.
Businesses have a duty of care to arrange for the disposal of their waste by a licensed carrier of trade waste and cannot place their waste into domestic waste bins.
Over the past two years, the council has employed two dedicated enforcement officers to visit businesses to see if they were disposing of their waste correctly. The officers found that a large percentage of businesses were concealing waste in grey domestic bins, which would then be collected free of charge by the council.
The council has now approved measures to issue businesses with an immediate fixed penalty notice, if they are unable to provide proof that their waste is being disposed of by a licensed waste carrier. This will apply to all businesses trading for more than the last 12 months.
However, the council will make allowances for any new businesses trading for less than one year and will offer the business owner the chance to take out a waste disposal contract. They will then revisit the premises after seven days to check if this has been done.
Bolton Council’s Executive Cabinet Member for Environmental Services, Councillor Nick Peel, said: “Flytippers are a blight on local neighbourhoods and their disgusting and arrogant behaviour needs to be stopped.
These new substantial fines will provide us with another tool to deal with flytippers and will be much quicker than prosecuting flytippers through the courts.
The new lamppost cameras will also allow us to catch more flytippers in the act and track them down afterwards.
We’re also targeting businesses who do not have proper arrangements to dispose of their waste and try to dispose of it through the domestic bins. This costs council taxpayers hundreds of thousands of pounds a year.
These new measures will help us get even tougher on those who commit envirocrimes and show them that this antisocial and lazy behaviour is not welcome in Bolton.”
Flytipping can be reported online http://www.bolton.gov.uk/flytipping.