Another outbreak of Fly Tipping. This time on the right hand side of Netherton lane, travelling towards the Cheltenham Road. Once again it is tyres that are the problem, just like last year. http://archive.eveshamjournal.co.uk/2007/1/22/445830.html
http://archive.eveshamjournal.co.uk/2006/12/7/439428.html

(Read the PS at the end of this article to find out why it is so often tyres)

If anyone knows anything about the latest outbreak they can report it either to the environmental hotline on 01386 565656

or Anonymously via crimestoppers:
http://archive.eveshamjournal.co.uk/2008/1/29/505147.html

According to an article in the Worcester News in April 2007, a flytipping incident is reported nationally every 12 seconds and in the Wychavon Area alone there were 944 cases reported with a clean up cost to local taxpayers of £47,502

Of course there is no excuse for fly tipping and those who do it are irresponsible criminals.

However, poorly considered waste management legislation and policy currently encourage fly tipping, making the problem worse:

Research shows that there are four groups of people who fly-tip.

In the first three cases, which presumably account for the vast majority of fly tipping, the reasons driving the behaviour can be summed up as:

“legitimate disposal of waste is expensive and inconvenient”

On a local level, the lack of convenience and abundance of red tape certainly seems to be an issue:

“On approaching the municipal tip recently in my company car which is a Nissan Navara – technically, I admit, a commercial vehicle – I was approached by a member of staff and told I couldn’t dump my son’s old mattress without a permit!

He handed me an application form which I have since completed and sent to County Hall in the hope that they send me, as I understand it, a book of eight numbered vouchers which allow me to visit the skips eight times during the year.!” http://archive.eveshamjournal.co.uk/2007/7/10/474068.html

“In another situation regarding rubbish, a friend took an old three-piece suite to the tip in his van. He’s a florist and the van has a sign written on it; he was not allowed to tip the suite because he was in the van. As you can gather, it would not fit in his car!” http://archive.eveshamjournal.co.uk/2007/7/2/472846.html

“READING last week’s Journal, I came across the story of fly tipping, Well I never! The Wychavon Council has got it wrong again, did they expect it not to happen, what now, with people having to have permits and licences, and the landfill tax going up it was bound to happen. When I go to the tip, all I get is, is it commercial waste or from home, does it matter ?” http://archive.eveshamjournal.co.uk/2007/5/10/464036.html

From an economic risk/reward point of view, the current system seems to actively encourage fly tipping and ensures that this particular crime, certainly pays.

In 2006 there were just 24,460 prosecutions out of the 2,425,081 fly-tipping incidents. This means that just 1 in every 100 fly-tipping incidents results in a prosecution.
http://www.countryside-alliance.org.uk/rural-services/rural-services-campaigns/fly%11tipping-%11-the-facts-and-the-law/

So the average cost to the criminal of fly-tipping is 1% (1/100) of the average fine.

The average fine for the more serious flytipping offences is £3,298. (More serious being at least a truck load)
http://www.defra.gov.uk/environment/localenv/flytipping/flycapture-data.htm

In other words:

A serious criminal fly tipper’s average cost, every time they tip a load illegally is just £32.98

For a legal operator. the current landfill tax is £24 a tonne and a truck load of waste can carry up to 20 tonnes)
http://www.defra.gov.uk/environment/localenv/flytipping/pdf/flytipping-causes.pdf

The legitimate cost of waste disposal, every time a load is legally tipped is up to, an incredible, £480.00

It is nearly 15 times as expensive to dispose of waste legally, even taking into account fines for getting caught.

If we make it increasingly more difficult and more expensive to dispose of waste legally, then we should not be surprised when we get an increase in fly tipping !

The answer to the fly tipping problem is simply to reverse the conditions that lead to it, i.e.:

“Make the legitimate disposal of waste cheaper and more convenient”

1) Eliminate the red tape that makes legitimate waste disposal inconvenient

2) Increase the opening hours of legitimate waste disposal sites

3) Either raise the detection rates and fines facing fly tippers to increase the cost of illegal activity OR reduce the costs of legitimate disposal to reduce the financial incentive that drives fly tipping.
(Stop the crime from paying and the crime will stop)

http://archive.eveshamjournal.co.uk/2003/3/27/219257.html

James Hickman

PS: Just in case you are curious as to why so much fly tipping in the area consists of tyres, you can trace this back to goverment policy as well:

In 2003 the EC Landfill Directive banned the land filling of whole tyres, thereby significantly increasing the disposal costs for this type of waste. A rare piece of published analysis by Oxford County Council showed that the costs of disposing of fly tipped tyres doubled in the year after the regulations came into force! http://www.defra.gov.uk/environment/localenv/flytipping/pdf/flytipping-causes.pdf

Posted on 02/17/08, 1:41 PM in Waste & Environment

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