Fly-tipping: Causes, Incentives and Solutions - Keep Britain Tidy

Fly-tipping: Causes, Incentives and Solutions
of “Put your waste back into the vehicle and take it away, you are being
filmed by CCTV cameras”(Maidstone Borough Council, 2002, p8).
• Registration of vehicles
Given that vehicles are so important in fly-tipping, much detection effort is
vehicle-led. This, however, is undermined by the ease with which
offenders can disguise the identity of their vehicles, not just through crude
efforts to obscure the number plate but also by registering false
information in the various vehicle, waste carrying and operating licensing
systems. For example, currently vehicles which carry waste do not have to
be individually registered as waste carriers. Waste carrier registration is
given to the companies who own the vehicles (Control of Pollution
(Amendment) Act 1989). Unless companies can keep a reliable check of
who is driving which vehicle at any particular time, it will be hard to use the
licensing system to detect fly-tippers. Registering individual vehicles could
remove this anonymity, although there would still be scope for registering
false identities. The increased effort required to evade detection may,
however, be sufficient to deter some offenders.
• Tax evasion charges
An alternative to trying to prosecute for fly-tipping is the seldom considered
option of charging offenders with ‘tax evasion’ in order to deter them from
fly-tipping. By failing to deposit waste in legal waste disposal sites
offenders are also failing to pay landfill tax, thus they could be charged
with tax evasion (Turner, Salmons, Powell & Craighill, 1998). This remedy
still requires offenders to be caught, and enough evidence still needs to be
in place for the charges to stick. However, simply advertising the fact that
offenders risk these charges may be enough to deter some, more so if
highly publicised examples are made of a few. Baroness Young of Old
Scone, the Chief Executive of the Environment Agency, has said that they
(the Environment Agency) have been examining the idea of using tax
evasion charges against fly-tipping offenders (Public Accounts Committee,
22 January 2003).
• Encouraging reporting
Maidstone Council (2002) suggested that a reward scheme should be in
place in their borough to encourage people to report fly-tipping. If a
resident gave information which led to a fly-tipper being successfully
prosecuted, the resident would receive a monetary reward up to the value
of £500 (Maidstone Borough Council, 2002). It is not known if this proposal
was implemented and, if so, whether it was effective. There will be many
challenges to implementing such a scheme and making it work. While
reward giving has been shown to work well in changing environmental
behaviour, it is often more cost effective to change the environment in
which the unwanted behaviour occurs (Huffmann et. al., 1995).
• Undercover operations
Undercover operations are another potential option in tackling fly-tipping
(Skumatz, Van Dusen & Carton, 2001). Undercover operations can lead to
arrests, and strategic use of publicity can make the most of any success to
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