Low fines could encourage fly-tipping in Bedford warns senior council officer

A fine could be cheaper than disposing of the rubbish properly, a senior council officer said.

The Environment and Sustainable Communities Overview and Scrutiny Committee (September 26) heard that current fines have remained unchanged since 2021, with the majority “at the same level as 2018”.

Paul Pace, chief officer (environment), said the fines had not been increased for a “combination of reasons”, while still being a deterrent and “reasonable” for the crime as well.

“The idea of giving a fixed penalty notice is so we can, as a local authority, deal with that particular individual or company, etc., in a more efficient way rather than taking the cases off to court, which ends up with that particular person normally having a criminal record,” Mr Pace said.

“It takes a lot of legal time and effort to build the case to the suitable format of the court.

“The fixed penalty notices have been used in a way to deal with that outside of the court.”

Mr Pace told the committee that some other local authorities use a sliding scale for the fines based on the scale of the offence

“We think that’s a very fair way [to issue fines],” Mr Pace said.

“We’re one of the local authorities in this area that has one of the lowest fixed penalty notices.

“And our concern about that is whether we will suddenly see a significant increase in fly tipping knowing that we may be seen as a lighter touch.

“‘Well actually if we drop a load of material off there the council’s only going to charge us £300 pound [which is] a damn sight cheaper than taking the time and trouble to actually dispose of it in the proper means’.

“We want to use fixed penalty notices as a deterrent to make sure that people don’t fly tip and where they do they are given a reasonable fine to change their behaviour,” he said.

The proposals for increasing fixed penalty notices still have to pass through the required stages before any changes are made.