Councillor Laura Robertson-Collins, Liverpool City Council’s Cabinet Member for Communities, Neighbourhoods and Streetscene, discusses the importance of a well-staffed Environmental Enforcement team when it comes to tackling fly-tipping and littering.
No-one likes to see rubbish lying around on our streets. Whether it’s fly-tipped furniture, littering at the side of the road, or dog fouling in the middle of a pavement, it doesn’t belong in our city. Liverpool is an incredible place to live and visit, and we should all be proud to call it home, but illegally dropping or dumping rubbish is disrespectful and selfish.
Recently, we announced that we were going to crack down on fly-tipping by appointing an external team to support with enforcement across the city. The truth is, we’ve already invested a lot into preventative measures and we’re starting to see a real difference.
In the 2024/25 financial year, the Council invested £475,000 to employ an internal Environmental Enforcement team, which is currently made up of six people. In 2025/26, we’re investing another £475,000 to be able to double the size of that team and have more officers working within the community to help prevent fly-tipping, littering, and dog fouling.
These officers have been out on the streets seven days a week since they joined the Council last summer. They patrol all areas of the city throughout the day, not just the city centre. It can be easy to assume that their main role is handing out fines to people who drop waste, but there’s so much more to what they do. They inspect businesses to make sure they manage their waste correctly and work alongside Merseyside Police to conduct waste carrier licence checks and trade waste inspections.
What’s more, they play a crucial role in educating our communities. By engaging with residents and businesses, they raise awareness about responsible waste disposal and prevent waste from being dumped in the first place. Did you know that if you hire a private company to take away your waste without checking they have the correct licence and it gets fly-tipped, you could be held responsible? These are the sorts of messages our team is passing on to residents.
By working closely together, our Environmental Enforcement team and LSSL ensure that all reported fly-tipping incidents are investigated and cleared in an average of 3.8 days.
The numbers speak for themselves. Since June last year, our officers have engaged with 617 residential properties and businesses about waste management, issuing almost 150 warnings where needed. They’ve also handed out 106 Fixed Penalty Notices and assisted with four prosecutions. Each of these investigations take a lot of time, but by doubling the size of the team, we know that we’ll have more time and more manpower to crack down on offenders.
From 2023 to 2024, reports of fly-tipping dropped by 5.7 per cent, and requests to clean streets decreased by 25 per cent. Their efforts, and the work of LSSL, make a tangible difference in keeping Liverpool cleaner and safer.
Liverpool City Council’s commitment to cracking down on illegal fly-tipping, littering, and dog fouling is unwavering. The new Environmental Enforcement Team, appointed last year, has already made significant strides in investigating and addressing these issues. With the addition of six new internal enforcement officers, we’re poised to enhance our efforts even further.
And there’s more good news on the horizon. An external team is set to start early this summer, providing extra support to tackle fly-tipping blighting our streets. They’ll work closely with the existing taskforce, raising awareness about correct waste management and investigating environmental crimes.
While we do work closely with the police to utilise our expansive CCTV network across the city, we can’t be everywhere at once. We ask anyone who spots illegal waste on our streets to report it to us so that we can investigate. And, if you have any information to help us with our investigation, please speak out. We know that the majority of people would like to keep their streets free of rubbish.
With the Great British Spring Clean coming back at the end of next month, now is the perfect time to join in with community litter-picking events, or even create one of your own. For more information, or to tell us about a clean-up event you’re planning, reach out to our Keep Liverpool Tidy team. Together, we can achieve a litter-free, waste-free city that we can truly be proud of.
