Litter
What is litter?
Litter can be as small as a sweet wrapper, as large as a bag of rubbish, or it can mean lots of items scattered about. ENCAMS (Environmental Campaigns) a charitable organisation which runs the Keep Britain Tidy campaign describes litter as “waste in the wrong place caused by human agency”. In other words, it is only people that make litter.
About £342 million a year is spent by local authorities in England on street cleaning and litter clearance.
What can we do ?
Campaigns have been carried out in schools to raise awareness of the problems associated with litter, and hundreds of people have made pledges to keep a small local area litter free.
Many members of the community 'do their bit'. A great example of this is Take Pride, where voluntary groups don their gloves, pick up their litter-pickers, and clean up their local area. If you or your group want to take part you will be provided with litter pickers and rubbish sacks and the rubbish will be picked up. Just let us know when your event is taking place by calling 01344 352000.
Litter Bins
There are over 650 litter bins in the Borough, each bin is able to take bagged dog waste and litter. To report an overflowing litter bin or any other litter bin related issue, please contact us using the details on the right.
The Law
The offence of ‘Leaving Litter’ (section 87 of the Environmental Protection Act statutory instrument (law)) 1990) is a criminal offence and either the police or local authority can prosecute people who drop litter. Local authority officers and/or litter wardens can give an on-the-spot £75 fixed penalty notice for littering. Average fines are around £95 but can rise to a maximum of £2,500 if taken to court.
Report a litter issue using the online form on the right. The form takes about 5 minutes to complete online and you can monitor your progress using the progress bar at the bottom of the screen.
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Litter leaflet (226kb)
