The issues

Countryside spoilt by fly-tippingFly-tipping occurs every 12 seconds at a cost to the public purse of around £72 a minute

Why we need to stop litter and fly-tipping

  • It costs taxpayers in excess of half a billion pounds annually to clear the streets of England, and that doesn’t include parks or other public spaces.
  • Nearly half the population (48%) admit to dropping litter.
  • The amount of litter dropped yearly in the UK has increased by 500% since the 1960s.
  • MPs get more letters complaining about litter and dog fouling than anything else.
  • It is illegal to drop litter, and you can be fined up to £80 on the spot if you’re caught littering.
  • According to a MORI poll in 2002, clean streets come only second to crime and hospitals in a survey of local issues.
  • A Mori poll in July 2007 found the public more concerned about litter and graffiti than they were about climate change.
  • Nationally, seven out of ten items of litter are food related.
  • An estimated 122 tons of cigarette butts and cigarette-related litter is dropped every day across the UK.
  • 1.3 million pieces of rubbish are dropped on Highways Agency roads alone every weekend (over a year this adds up to a whopping 67.2 million pieces of rubbish). A third of drivers admitting to throwing litter while on the road.
  • The rat population has boomed to 60 million due to the huge amounts of litter around. This means there are now almost as many rats as people in the UK.
  • Over 69,000 animals killed or injured by litter last year in Britain.
  • Litter, such as cigarette butts, plastic bags and other plastics, harms animal and marine life in a variety of ways such as water pollution, when these items are mistaken for food and when creatures get caught up in plastics and get strangled. It is estimated that every year over 1 million seabirds and 100,000 turtles and sea mammals die of litter related causes.
  • Over 373,000 pieces of litter were found on beaches in the UK in 2006 – equivalent to 1,989 items per kilometre – the Marine Conservation Society reports a 90% increase in beach litter since 2004.
  • The general level of litter has dropped from ‘satisfactory’ to ‘unsatisfactory’ in the last 12 months by Government’s own measures and standards.
  • The most recent Government study on local environmental cleanliness showed that there has been a significant increase in roadside litter to moving it into the ‘unsatisfactory’ category for the first time in the six years the survey has been conducted.
  • Litter makes an area look dirty and uncared for and attracts more litter. Littered areas are not pleasant to be in and are less likely to be used by people. In contrast, people are more reluctant to litter clean areas.
  • Littered items are a lost resource. When things that could otherwise be recycled, like PET, glass bottles and paper, are littered, they do not end up in the recycling stream.
Biodegradability
Any type of litter takes a long time to disappear naturally, so whatever the material the right thing to do is not to drop it in the first place. Degradability depends on climate and circumstances, but under unfavourable conditions estimated time spans are:
  • orange peel and banana skins – up to 2 years
  • cigarette butts – up to 2 years
  • plastic bags –10-20 years
  • tin cans – 50 years
  • aluminum cans – 80-100 years
  • plastic bottles – indefinitely
  • glass – indefinitely
Facts about fly-tipping
Fly-tipping is the common term used to describe waste illegally deposited on land and in simple terms, a single bin bag upwards to thousands of tonnes of construction and demolition waste may constitute a fly-tip.

The illegal disposal of waste is an anti-social behaviour that is adversely affecting the amenity of our local environments and reducing civic pride. Fly-tipping poses a threat to humans and wildlife, damages our environment, and spoils our enjoyment of our towns and countryside.

  • A new incident of fly-tipping occurs every 12 seconds at a cost to the public purse of around £72 a minute.
  • £73.7 million – the estimated cost of clearance of illegally dumped waste reported by local authorities in 2006/07
  • £47 million – the estimated the cost of clearing fly-tipping from agricultural land alone in 2005/06 (Environment Agency). Areas subject to repeated fly-tipping may suffer declining property prices and local businesses may suffer as people stay away.
  • Local authorities in England reported that they had dealt with more than 2.6 million incidents of fly-tipping in 2006/07 – up five per cent on 2005/06.
  • There were only 1,796 successful prosecutions of fly-tipping in 2006/07 – a 1 in 1,460 chance of being successfully prosecuted.
  • Over half (56%) of fly-tipping incidents reported were in alleyways.
  • Black bags full of domestic rubbish account for 63% of all fly-tipping.
  • 77% of fly-tips involved household waste – a 5.4 per cent increase on 2005/06.
  • 95% of farmers have cleared up other people’s rubbish from their land.
  • Most people fly-tip to avoid paying the disposal fee called the landfill tax. Household rubbish is already paid for through council tax, but other waste is not, and a charge generally exists to have this waste removed or even to drop the waste off at a licensed tip yourself.
  • Fly-tipping can incur fines of up to £20,000 and/or 6 months imprisonment. Fines are unlimited if the case goes to the Crown Court or up to 2 years imprisonment, and up to 5 years if hazardous waste is dumped.
CPRE: litter campaigning 1926 – 2009
CPRE has a long history of engagement with litter dating back to the late 1920s as notable pioneers, with the Women’s Institute, in anti-litter campaigning and encouraging local councils to organise official waste collections to cut down on illegal dumping in ponds and hedgerows. In the 1950s, following conferences at the Ministry of Works with CPRE and the National Trust, the Government launched the ‘Keep Britain Tidy’ campaign in preparation for the Festival of Britain and a new anti-litter drive for the Coronation year which led to the Tidy Village competition at CPRE branch level.

In 1972, the Government increased the annual Keep Britain Tidy budget, allowing it to expand across Britain. As a result of this expansion, CPRE ceased campaigning nationally on litter issues but continued to be represented on the Keep Britain Tidy Group committee; branches continued to campaign locally and worked closely with Keep Britain Tidy to help expand its activities.

CPRE tackled the waste agenda once again between 1995 and early 1998 engaging with the Government’s emerging waste strategy Making Waste Work consultation, the Sustainable Waste Management House of Commons Environment Sub-Committee Enquiry and then on the Waste Strategy 2000. In 1997 CPRE published its Waste and the Countryside, examining the problems of waste from a countryside and land use perspective.

In July 2007, Bill Bryson was elected President of CPRE coming to the role with passion and commitment to clean up the English countryside. April 2008 sees the launch of a new flagship campaign Stop the Drop, a 3-year, anti-litter and fly-tipping campaign to raise awareness, change behaviour and most importantly restore the English countryside to its former beauty for all to enjoy.

For a fuller history of CPRE’s campaigning on litter contact the press office: press@cpre.org.uk or phone 020 7981 2880.