The number of fixed penalty notices issued for fly-tipping in England has increased by 11% to 76,000 in 2018/19.
This is the second most common action, after investigations, and accounted for 15% of all actions in 2018/19, according to news figures published by government today (7 Nov).
For the 2018/19 year (April 2018 to March 2019), local authorities in England dealt with over 1 million (1,072,000) fly-tipping incidents, an increase of 8% from the 998,000 reported in 2017/18.
This statistical notice published today covers trends in the number of fly- tipping incidents, fly-tipping incidents by land type, waste type and size.
It also covers enforcement and prosecution actions undertaken for fly-tipping incidents.
It excludes the majority of private-land incidents and large scale incidents dealt with by the Environment Agency.
Fly-tipping in England
Nearly two thirds (62%) of fly-tips involved household waste. Total incidents involving household waste increased by 2% from 2017/18.
Consistent with previous years, the most common place for fly-tipping to occur was on highways (pavements and roads), which accounted for almost half (46%) of total incidents in 2018/19.
The number of highway incidents has increased by 6% from 2017/18.
As in the last few years, the most common size category for fly-tipping incidents in 2018/19 was equivalent to a ‘small van load’ (33% of total incidents), followed by the equivalent of a ‘car boot or less’ (30%).
In 2018/19, 36,000 or 3% of total incidents were of ‘tipper lorry load’ size or larger, which is similar to 2017/18. For these large fly-tipping incidents, the cost of clearance to local authorities in England in 2018/19 was £12.9 million, compared with £12.2 million in 2017/18.
Local authorities carried out 499,000 enforcement actions in 2018/19, an increase of 5,000 actions (1%) from 2017/18.
For 2018/19, 12,000 (16%) of fixed penalty notices were issued specifically for small scale fly-tipping, 37,000 (48%) in relation to littering and 26,000 (35%) in relation to other offences.
The number of fines issued increased by 6% to 2,052 in 2018/19, with the value of total fines increasing to £1,090,000 (an increase of 29% on the £843,000 total value of fines in 2017/18).