Happy New Year everyone! This time of year often involves packing away the Christmas decorations, throwing out the Christmas tree, sorting through children’s toys to make room for the new influx and having a general spring clean.
With all this domestic activity, householders may be inclined to forget their Duty of Care regarding the responsible disposal of this waste. This rise in available waste could lead to an increase in illegal operators collecting the waste for a small fee then fly-tipping the material onto private land.
I therefore urge members so remain vigilant regarding prevention techniques and ensure their land looks like an unattractive place for fly-tipping to occur. Measures can include:
- Preventing access by installing gates, barriers and warning signs.
- Making sure gates are closed when not in use.
- Improve visibility so that fly-tippers are not hidden from view - limited clearing of areas or small-scale re-landscaping can reduce hidden corners.
- Install or improve lighting and security cameras.
While these measures may be effective in some cases they cannot resolve the problem in all areas.
The NFU is involved in some excellent regional partnership initiatives where local authorities, the Environment Agency, the police and the NFU work together to improve prevention, clean-up and prosecution.
Examples include:
- The Essex Rural Partnership (ERP): Brings together key organisations in Essex to consider, debate and act on major issues affecting the rural parts of the county.
- Tip-off: Suffolk Campaign – which includes multi-agency enforcement days, regular meetings, awareness raising regarding duty of care and reporting.
The NFU sits on the National Fly-Tipping Prevention Group (NFTPG). This group contains Defra, Environment Agency and Local Government Association amongst others. The group published a National Framework for England for tackling fly-tipping through local partnerships. The Framework encourages groups to work collaboratively by sharing information and intelligence and establishing links with the NFTPG to create a positive feedback cycle of action, learning and improvement.
If you are interested in developing a partnership initiative in your area or finding out if one exists get in touch with your NFU Regional Office to discuss further.