County council pledges £250k to tackle flytipping as new tip charges due to begin

Margate recycling centre

Kent County Council has pledged to invest £250,000 to tackle fly-tipping.

The announcement comes just days before charges are brought in for non-household waste at the Household Waste and Recycling Centres (HWRC), including those at Margate and Richborough.

KCC operates 18 HWRCs, providing facilities for the recycling and disposal of more than 30 different types of waste but is not obligated to accept non-household waste at its sites, such as soil, rubble, hardcore and plasterboard.

From June 3 these will incure a charge of £4 per bag for soil, rubble and hardcore and £6 per bag of Plasterboard

Agreement on the scheme was reached during a meeting of the Environment & Transport Cabinet Committee on January 17.

County council leader Paul Carter says the fund will now be put in place to deal with any flytipping issue.

He said: “We will be providing an additional £250,000 to crackdown on flytipping, an anti-social crime often carried out by criminal gangs. Over 90% of fly-tipped waste we see in the county could have been disposed of for free at an HWRC or from a kerbside collection.

“While I do not believe the new policy will turn law-abiding citizens into criminals, I cannot predict what criminal gangs might do in response. However, we will be launching a campaign for additional enforcement with the money being made available to the Kent Environmental Crime Waste Practitioners Group which includes Kent Police, the Environment Agency, the National Farmers’ Union (NFU), DVSA and district and borough councils.

“Yesterday we spoke to Kent Police, NFU and a number of district councillors who are encouraged and enthused by this additional investment. This campaign will now take enforcement and detection to a new level.”

A new  household waste site for Kent will also be built in Tonbridge and Malling, alongside successful negotiations allowing Kent residents to use Medway sites

Each year Kent’s household waste sites receive approximately 185,000 tonnes of waste and 3.5 million visits, at a cost of approximately £10 million to the taxpayer.

9 Comments

  1. Absolutely ridiculous policy. £250.000 to fight fly tipping is peanuts and will run into millions in reality. A blind man can see that. If KCC had ‘real’ recycling depots they could have open door for free tipping and cash in on the discarded metals and items to sell on plus the making of compost to sell. Charging £6 for a bag of plaster board ????? Plaster board sheet 6ft by 4ft how many bags would that need ?? Ridiculous.

  2. Stupidity only matched by parliament.

    I pay 1650 pounds in council tax and these idiots want 4 pounds a bag for houshold building rubble.

    Of course builders abuse the existing facility but the recycling centre never check the daily trips of 4×4’s or trailer loads of rubble. Staff know the regulars but turn a blind eye. Other councils demand proof of residence and location of rubble source, why not here?

  3. KCC were concerned that:
    (a) that residents from neighbouring authorities were dumping their waste in KCC recycling sites.These Councils also charge. Thanet is at least 70 miles away from our nearest County, so that does not apply.
    (b) To pay for adult social care, which is a problem in the 100’s of millions and a tip charge is hardly going to make any difference.
    # Charging for waste will increase fly-tipping.
    # 25% of the revenue will pay for a new site at Allington, where the incinerator lives, in Tonbridge + Malling.
    # Not long ago KCC wanted to close Richborough tip and may do so again.
    # KCC had done a deal with Medway so part of reason (a) is already resolved. If they do the same with E.Sussex and Surrey ,problem solved and the charges are redundant.
    Of course that won’t happen.

  4. Thanet residents paying for a problem in west Kent re Sussex residents border hopping

  5. £250,000 to tackle flytipping yet we will have to pay £4 a bag to deposit stuff at tip ! Plasterboard sadly will end up in peoples general rubbish either at the tip or in bin collections !

  6. The parking for off loading is ridiculous , every other lane should be marked with yellow cross hatch lines to allow for drivers to leaveas soon as they have unloaded . At the present time you can wait for agesfor a convenient route to get out .

  7. Yes there should be Free lanes with yellow lines at the margate tip , if there was an emergency there , a fire , car fire or other scenario , and place was busy , you just wouldnt be able to get out quickly !

  8. How is it that every resident can see the stupidity of this new policy, but not KCC?? Of course there is going to be more fly-tipping. If they made the charge £4 per load that would be far more reasonable but per bag is ridiculous. But if this does stem from a problem in West Kent, why not simply ask to see a driving licence showing residence when people enter the tip in that area? Problem solved!

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