Harrow Struck By Fly Tipping Epidemic
83% of reported fly-tipping incidents over a one year period received no council-led action.
Statistics have revealed that Harrow has a huge fly-tipping epidemic the borough is currently facing.
The findings show that no action was taken by the council against 83% of reported fly-tipping incidents over a one-year period.
In 2017/18, there were 9,626 incidents of fly-tipping reported in Harrow, yet only 1,622 actions taken. 5,636 of these incidents were of unidentified waste types, and 2,145 were on unidentified land types, which Alexandra Nethercot, Senior Community Engagement Officer at Harrow Council admits means the council ‘remains unclear as to what these unidentified incidents are”.
40% increase
A report from the council also revealed that the borough has seen a 40% increase on the previous year. It also states that “prevention measures not working” may be a factor contributing to the issue, and cites “lack of availability of authorised waste disposal sites due in main to neighbouring Local Authorities either shutting their sites or introducing charging regimes,” may be at the root of the problem.
The report also states that 85% of actions taken in Harrow were investigations, 4.7% were warning letters and 5.5% came in the form of Duty of Care visits. There were no prosecution charges brought forward.
New IT system in development
Speaking on the findings, Nethercot said that Harrow Council are currently “in the process of reviewing and redeveloping our fly-tipping web form and mobile app with a new IT system”.
In neighbouring Hackney, which had 9821 incidents, the number of actions taken over the same period of time stood at 11,172.
Why did students cover this story?
Students Tahminah, 13, and Fatima, 14, from London, picked this topic because they felt it was important adding; “We ourselves have had experiences and issues with fly-tipping in Harrow”.