Fly-tippers strike again as latest 10 tonne rubbish heap will cost £10,000 to remove
Massive £10,000 Fly tip in little Guppins Lane, Upminster. Cllr Bob Benham. - Credit: Archant
A 10 tonne, 9ft high fly-tip which will cost £10,000 to remove is the latest mound of rubbish to be left strewn all over a notorious dumping hotspot.
Havering Council waste enforcement officers were made aware of the heap in Little Gerpins lane, Upminster, this morning as cars were unable to pass through the lane.
The site in Upminster is checked on a daily basis by officers with fly-tips routinely found.
This is despite there being a recycling centre little more than one mile away.
The council recorded nearly 3,000 incidents of fly-tipping last year, with removal costs reaching the £160,000 mark.
A council report published on Wednesday shows the number of fly-tips has reached 2,791 by December 2015, up from 2,144 the same time last year – leading the council to miss its quarterly target.
The report says a majority of fly-tips are small in size but there has been a “concerning rise” in the number of large scale fly-tipping in and around the lanes in Upminster and Rainham.
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Havering Council is now promising a crackdown on fly-tippers in the borough.
Cllr Robert Benham, cabinet member for Environment, said: “We’ve had more than enough of this. I’m truly appalled at what can only be described as an industrial scale fly-tip.
“Council taxpayers will have to pay £10,000 or more to remove it. This is money that is desperately needed to fund vital front line services.
“We’re going to be pulling out all the stops to crack down on these perpetrators. I’ll be pressing for a custodial sentence for the next large-scale fly-tipper we catch.”
While covert CCTV is still used by the council to identify and prosecute offenders, the implementation of a council-wide operation to crack down on offenders has been recommended along with the appointment of a strategic commissioner to manage it.