Anne Main MP has expressed her concerns about the environmental effect and cost to the taxpayer of littering and fly-tipping.
‘When someone litters, it is not only anti-social, it is hugely costly to the taxpayer’, she said.
In a series of written questions sent to the Department of Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs, the St Albans MP asked what the impact of littering is and what the Government is doing to tackle it. Writing to Anne, the minister Therese Coffey said her department estimated that ‘the annual cost to local government of clearing litter in England runs to hundreds of millions of pounds.’
The minister said the top ten types of litter found on the highest percentage of sites were smokers’ materials, confectionary packs, non-alcoholic drinks-related, fast-food related, snack packs, other packaging, alcoholic drinks-related, paper tissues, vehicles parts, and discarded food and drink.
Land-based sources constitute around 80% of the litter reaching the marine environment. The U.N. estimates that over 5 million pieces of plastic enter the oceans each day from land. Anne thinks that this is unacceptable.
Mrs Main said: ‘Whether it’s small-scale littering, like dropping cigarettes on the floor, or brazen fly-tipping along a country road, litter is damaging our beautiful blue waters and green areas and must stop. The Government should lead the way by introducing more effective ways to deter offenders.’
St Albans has long-suffered from incidents of fly-tipping, which is the illegal dumping of commercial and residential waste in public areas. The minister said the department is ‘committed to tackling fly-tipping’ and has given local councils the power to issue fixed penalty notices for small-scale fly-tipping since May 2016.
Responding to the minister, Anne said that she commends the actions taken, however, will wait to see if there has been any improvement when the new nationals figures for fly-tipping are released in March.
Watch: Anne Main, chair of the All Party Parliamentary Group on Bangladesh, talks about the Rohingya crisis and urges support for @DECappeal pic.twitter.com/FFL0lq8O0A
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