Fly tipping can have big consequences, police warn

Small amounts of fly tipping can create "massive environmental consequences" for the countryside and land owners, police say.

At an operation in Bognor, Sgt Tom Carter from Sussex Police's rural crime team has told BBC Radio Sussex that a "small number of people acting illegally have the power to create a vast problem in the countryside".

He says fly tipping can create large issues for the environment, including affecting water courses, contaminating ground water, and having an especially big impact on farmland, crops and livestock.

The government said on Thursday that fly tippers would be forced to pay for cleaning up dumped waste under plans which are being consulted on until October.

He says: "It only takes one fly tipping incident to have massive environmental consequences, so just one incident is too much."

Sussex Police sees large fly tipping incidents "more sporadically" than in some other parts of the county, Carter says.

"We take this really, really seriously. We can make a big difference with just a small number of people."

Sussex Police runs operations once a month each in East Sussex and West Sussex to stop potentially illegal waste carriers, and to offer advice, he added.

The number of fly tipping incidents per capita in the South East has risen every year since 2022/23, according to data released by the Department for the Environment, Farming and Rural Affairs (Defra) in February.

Enforcement actions such as fixed penalty notices across the UK have also risen each year since 2019/20, but fines resulting from prosecutions remain below pre-pandemic levels.

In Sussex, Ashdown Forest has previously seen a spate of fly-tipping incidents, with particular incidents also in Kent and the wider South East.

Sussex Police and Crime Commissioner Katy Bourne said: "One of the biggest complaints I get from the public is fly tipping. What is really annoying is that if its dumped on private land then the onus to clean it up is on the landowner.

"This is very much about prevention work as well. It makes the experience on the roads safer for everyone."

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