FLY-TIPPING is a blight on our communities. 

Discovering half the old contents from someone’s home on your kerbside isn’t pleasant.

Last week Glasgow City Council (GCC) fined a person £500 for fly-tipping in their local community on the Southside of the city.

The ability of councils to issue fixed penalty notices (FPNs) for fly-tipping was uprated from January 1 this year. The 2023 Fly-tipping (Fixed Penalty) (Scotland) Order – increased FPNs from £200 to £500.

In the 12 months to May 1 2024, almost 500 penalties were issued for domestic and commercial waste and fly-tipping offences in the city. Since 2022, GCC has operated a “seven weeks of action” initiative where it endeavours to crack down on fly-tipping.

Council officers work to identify hot spots and work with local housing providers, police, charities and residents to target those who dump their rubbish on our streets.

Local Southside community campaigner Danny Phillips said: “I agree with the council fining people for dumping their old stuff in the street. It’s anti-social behaviour. Communities can be blighted by fly-tipping. And often it’s landlords or businesses who don’t live in the area. So, it’s no consequence to them. We have had beds, fridges and entire bathrooms dumped in our street”.

Last summer, almost 150 enforcement notices were issued to Glasgow businesses in just seven weeks as part of efforts to tackle fly-tipping.

Commercial waste officers in the GCC’s environmental health department issued notices to businesses which had no commercial waste contracts in place. More than 600 businesses were visited by officers during the council’s seven weeks of action last year.

Officers also carried out 342 fly-tipping investigations, engaged with 283 households and issued a further 26 fixed penalty notices for fly-tipping during the seven weeks of action last year.

Charges for removing bulky waste were first introduced following a meeting of GCC in February 2020. With funding cuts to local government from Holyrood, charging for uplifting bulky items is now a feature of most council’s waste management services in Scotland.

Standard and large electrical items are £5 per item to uplift, while very large “special items” are £80 per uplift. What can you do if you can’t afford to pay uplift charges?

Glasgow has four waste recycling centres where you can drop off bulk waste for free: Dawsholm Recycling Centre (G20 0TB); Easter Queenslie Recycling Centre (G33 4UL) Polmadie Recycling Centre (G42 0PJ) and the Shieldhall Recycling Centre (G51 4FE) – all open Monday to Sunday, from 8am to 6pm.

But as Danny Phillips points out, not everyone can access these centres: “It’s difficult to do if you don’t have a car to take stuff to the recycle centre. But I do think the council could make it a lot easier. We don’t get enough information about how and when we can get rid of larger items. And make pickups more regular”.

Fining and ultimately prosecuting repeat fly-tipping offenders is self-evidently necessary. But surely, we need more positive incentives and not just a punitive “stick-only” approach to environmentally friendly waste disposal?

For hot spot areas, the Scottish Government could help fund local charities and housing associations to provide a free bulk uplift service with eligibility criteria. This could be done on a pilot basis to establish value for public money.