Flytipping clean-up in Lancaster district costs nearly £250k

Flytipping has cost Lancaster taxpayers nearly a quarter of a million pounds to clean up over the past year, shock figures released by Defra have revealed.
Flytipping in the Lancaster district cost the taxpayer nearly £250k to clean up in the past year.Flytipping in the Lancaster district cost the taxpayer nearly £250k to clean up in the past year.
Flytipping in the Lancaster district cost the taxpayer nearly £250k to clean up in the past year.

Between 2016-17, there were 3,765 incidents of flytipping cleaned up by the local authority at a cost of £221.192, just over 1,000 more incidents than those recorded between 2015-2016 which came to 2,750.

On a regional level, there were 128,193 reported flytipping incidents in the North West between April 2016 and March 2017 – an increase of nine per cent on last year.

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This comes as Lancaster City Council said they had 116 reported incidents of flytipping in the district in December alone.

In a bid to tackle flytipping, Lancaster City Council now has two mobile cameras located at flytipping hotspots to catch people in the act of dumping their rubbish illegally.

Coun Brendan Hughes, Cabinet member with responsibility for environmental services, said: “The clearing up of illegally dumped rubbish from whatever source continues to be constant battle for the council and the environment as well as being an unnecessary burden on the council taxpayer’s purse.

“Flytipping comes in all shapes and sizes; whether it be a bag of household rubbish left in an alley way, unwanted building materials dumped at the side of a road or at a local beauty spot or an empty crisp packet thrown from a car window, everyone should take pride in the district and look after the environment by disposing of their rubbish responsibly.”

To report incidents of flytipping call customer services on 01524 582491.