Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, if she will make an estimate of the number of active illegal waste sites.

At the end of Q4 2022/23 April this year, the Environment Agency (EA) was aware of 415 active illegal waste sites in England. In the last three years the EA has stopped over 2,500 illegal waste sites. The EA tackles illegal waste sites by taking an intelligence-led approach to prevent and disrupt criminality and by prioritising enforcement action on the offending that poses the greatest threat, risk and harm.