The startling statistic was announced by Minister for Local Environmental Quality, Ben Bradshaw, at a Cleaner, Safer, Greener conference, organised by the Keep Britain Tidy campaign. Mr Bradshaw said he was ‘disturbed’ to hear that of the 20,000 fixed penalty notices (FPNs) issued in England in 2004/05, 8,000 (or 40%) were never paid.
Mr Bradshaw continued:
“Far too many local authorities are treating fixed penalty notices as some kind of voluntary fining scheme – what kind of message does that send to the litterbugs and vandals? People will only take these fines seriously if local authorities take them seriously. In the short-term, targeting resources at cleaning up might seem like the best idea, but it just isn’t efficient. We need to look at changing behaviour.
“This can be achieved through education and campaigns, but where that doesn’t work we need strict enforcement of the law. Thanks to the Clean Neighbourhoods and Environment Act, local authorities will soon have powers to issue fines for a wider range of crimes: these are powers they have asked for, and they are powers they must use. It’s no good issuing fines only to let these litterbugs, fly-posters and irresponsible dog owners get away with it.”
In the East Midlands in 2004/05, 1,206 notices were issued for litter. 746 were paid, 460 were unpaid and 42 cases were taken to court. Fines for dog fouling were issued on 129 occassions, 120 of which were paid. 20 cases were taken to court.
