Smokers fined for littering streets

six people have been prosecuted by Rotherham Council after being caught dropping cigarettes in the street by civil enforcement officers who have been instructed by bosses to stage a crackdown on littering.

By The Newsroom

Published 2nd Feb 2011, 16:51 BST

Three of the defendants failed to appeared before Rotherham Magistrates and were each convicted in their absence, fined £175 and ordered to pay costs of £180.74 and a victim surcharge of £15.

One woman appeared while two other defendants contacted the court to admit the offence.

They were fined £75, ordered to pay costs of £60 and a £15 victim surcharge.

Coun Jahangir Akhtar, cabinet member for housing and neighbourhoods at Rotherham Council, said cigarette ends might be small, but make up a huge amount of the litter found on the streets of Rotherham.

He added: “A massive 122 tonnes of cigarette ends and other cigarette-related litter is dropped everyday in the UK, making it an on-going problem for local authorities to clear-up.

“In addition cigarette ends can take up to 12 years to degrade because every cigarette end contains up to 4,000 different chemicals including hydrogen and cyanide.”

Rotherham Council Rotherham