Leeds City Council blunder: 1,600 penalties for littering sent out with legislation 'misprint'

Dropping or leaving litter is a criminal offence under the 1990 Environmental Protection Act.

But the Yorkshire Evening Post understands that the authority's fixed penalty notices, demanding payment from people who have littered, have failed to include the word 'environment' when stating the name of the act.

The council told the YEP today that the blunder has affected around 1,600 notices.

It claimed the error did not affect the validity of the penalty, which was still payable, and said it had scrapped the "misprinted" notices.

A spokeswoman said: "We would like to thank the eagle eyed individuals that noticed the slight misprint recently on a number of our fixed penalty notices for littering.

"This does not affect the validity of the notices which contained the necessary details such as when and where the offence took place.

“We would like to apologise for any confusion caused and have removed the misprinted notices from circulation to avoid further confusion."