Illegal Waste: Organised Crime

Gareth Snell Excerpts

Monday 17th November 2025 Commons Chamber

[Emma Hardy]

Of course we need to have a legal operating system, and it needs to be based on the cost of enforcement. We cannot have a legal system that ends up costing the Government and the taxpayer more. There needs to be a system that is fair and that operates well, but one of the fundamental problems we have with waste crime is that the Environment Agency was previously so badly underfunded.

[Gareth Snell (Stoke-on-Trent Central) (Lab/Co-op)]

While the dumping and the criminal gangs that perpetrate the dumping are one part of this, the other part is the businesses that seek to circumvent the legitimate routes for getting rid of their waste by passing it on to those companies that are illegally dumping in the first place. Can the Minister say a bit more about what action might be taken to educate businesses on their responsibilities for their waste, and what this Government can do to prosecute not just the dumpers but the people who are producing the waste and not dealing with it themselves?

[Emma Hardy]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. There needs to be greater education on who we are giving our waste to. Digital waste tracking will make a big difference, because we will be able to see whether the waste ends up in the place where it is meant to end up.