Community skips could be rolled out across the borough in bid to drive down fly-tipping

‘Community skips’ could be rolled out in a bid to drive down fly-tipping in the borough.

Rochdale had the highest levels of illegal dumping in the region bar Manchester between April and September last year, while the number of recorded fly-tips more than doubled from 2017 to 2020.

Last month council bosses announced that CCTV was going to play a bigger role in tackling the issue – having acquired its first ‘environmental enforcement camera’.

Now councillors have backed plans for areas to get their own skips, in a further effort to tackle the problem.

They unanimously supported a motion from Councillor Wendy Cocks at this month’s remote full council meeting.

It said that a new approach to fly-tipping was ‘urgently needed’ given its escalation – both nationally and locally – over recent years.

The motion also noted that residents need a car to get to their local tip – while no such facilities exist in Heywood or the Pennines (Littleborough, Milnrow and Newhey).

Councillor Cocks said the borough had been fortunate its tips had remained open for much of the pandemic period – but the council wanted to encourage people to recycle and reuse, rather than ‘just tipping’.

The Labour councillor told the meeting: “This motion is part of a way forward in our recovery.

“It’s looking for a solution – a way to break the cycle and get us all back on track as we come out of lockdown and work together to improve our streets, our green spaces, our environment and our wellbeing.”

 

 

The motion – which also calls for the government to give the Environment Agency more ‘robust powers’ to deal with industrial fly-tippers – was largely welcomed by opposition parties.

There were some caveats, however.

Liberal Democrat group leader Councillor Andy Kelly said community skips would work- but only alongside other measures.

He reiterated his call to reintroduce free bulky-waste collections- noting this appeared to be key to Wigan having the lowest fly-tipping rates in Greater Manchester.

Councillor Kelly made a similar case at a scrutiny committee meeting last month.

And the Conservatives wanted quicker action rather than the ‘laborious’ process of taking the proposal to a scrutiny committee meeting – potentially some months down the line.

Tory group leader Councillor Ashley Dearnley said: “I like action and I like quick action. Please get on with it now.

“The cost of skips can’t be so significant. Why wait all that time?”

Councillor Dearnley added that the council should look at how it could speed up implementing new policies.

“I still think we need to look, going forward, at the way we are doing things.

“It’s very long-winded to bring this notice of motion that we all agree with – we all want to see as many measures as possible to stop fly-tipping – do we really need this long procedure?”

However, Councillor Liam O’Rourke – who seconded the motion – said the checks and balances provided by scrutiny committees was essential.

“If you give people the opportunity it fills up quickly,” he said.

“That costs a lot of money, which means we have got to do it right and we have got to plan it, otherwise it’s going to be a free for all that’s going to cost the taxpayer money and not achieve the cleanliness we want to achieve in the long term.”

He added that colleagues and other authorities had ‘found to their peril’ the consequences of bypassing scrutiny.

Describing fly-tipping as an ‘absolute blight’, he added: “We, in the Labour group, thought this was an important thing to put forward to give ourselves as many tools as possible to make our residents areas as clean and prosperous as possible.”

The full meeting of Rochdale Council was held on Wednesday 24 March.

Nick Statham, Local Democracy Reporter