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

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps he is taking to support local government to help tackle flytipping and littering.

Local councils have wide ranging enforcement powers to help them tackle littering and fly-tipping. These include fixed penalty notices of up to £1000 to fly-tippers and £500 to those who litter, prosecution action and, in the case of fly-tipping, vehicle seizure. We encourage councils to make good use of their enforcement powers, and we are currently seeking powers in the Crime and Policing Bill to issue statutory fly-tipping enforcement guidance.

We have committed to forcing fly-tippers and vandals to clean up the mess that they have created as part of a crackdown on anti-social behaviour. We will provide further details on this commitment in due course.

Defra also chairs the National Fly-Tipping Prevention Group through which we work with a wide range of stakeholders, such as local authorities and the Environment Agency, to promote and disseminate good practice with regards to preventing fly-tipping. Various practical tools are available from their webpage which is available here.