Fly-tippers will be publicly shamed and forced to clean up dumped rubbish, Defra says
Fly-tippers will be publicly shamed and forced to clean up dumped rubbish as part of a new Government strategy designed to crack down on organised waste crime.
The Department of the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs today published its Waste Crime Action Plan, which it says sets out a “zero-tolerance approach” to fly-tipping.
This will see fly-tippers forced to complete 20 hours of unpaid work tidying streets and parks as part of new “clean-up squads”, and ordered to repay the cost of cleaning up the waste they illegally dumped.
Defra said it is giving the Environment Agency an additional £45m over the next three years to clamp down on the organised gangs that are running illegal waste dumps.
EA officers will be handed special policy-style powers to intervene earlier and target gangs’ finances.
The watchdog is set to create a new Operational Waste Intelligence and Analysis, which will use aerial surveillance and financial data to hunt down the crooks.
EA chief executive Phillip Duffy said: “We will act earlier, faster and smarter by shutting down illegal sites before they become established, using our powers decisively to strip rogue operators of their permits, and working with police, HMRC and councils to go after criminal assets.
“These measures will ensure we stay one step ahead of waste criminals and protect the communities, businesses and environment that they blight.”
The Government is also going to pay to clean up an industrial site in Sheffield (chasing more details) where 20,000 tonnes of rubbish has been fly-tipped, in one of the worst cases in England.
Environment Secretary Emma Reynolds said: “Waste criminals have been damaging our communities, countryside, environment and economy for too long.
“This action plan sends a clear message: dump illegally and you will face the full consequences.
“Waste criminals will be forced to join clean up squads and made to pay for the clearing of illegal waste sites.
“We will give enforcement officers new police-style powers to bring offenders to justice.”
It comes as the latest figures show there was a whopping 17 per cent increase in illegal waste dumps across Yorkshire and the Humber from 2023-24 to 2024-25, when the number of incidents reached more than 100,000.
This was the highest level since comparable records began in 2019.
Throughout the Dales, rubbish is being dumped at the side of the roads, with detritus blowing into the stunning Yorkshire countryside.
Bogus waste-disposal companies are using local Facebook groups to offer cash-in-hand collections of household rubbish, and then dumping it in laybys or farm tracks.
These are largely being run by organised criminal gangs, who are raking in huge amounts of cash from the lucrative illegal waste dumping.
The House of Lords’ cross-party Environment and Climate Change Committee said last year that the gangs are then channeling the money into drugs, money laundering and modern slavery.
Only a fraction of fly-tippers or litterers are ever prosecuted, as tracking them down from dumping grounds with no witnesses or CCTV is difficult for overstretched police and council staff.
Experts said that this kind of fly-tipping has become the “new narcotics” and overall the environmental, social and economic costs are totalling £1bn a year.