Poole launches crackdown on littering (From Thisisdorset)

I have just raised this same issue, emailing our local MP for zero tolerance on litter in Christchurch.
I've come to the conclusion that there are people/kids who don't understand the word litter! Perhaps bins should be labelled Rubbish!
There should be on the spot fines. The councils haphazardly target smokers and people who don't pick up after their dogs, yet it seems perfectly acceptable to strew plastic drink bottles, tin cans and any other wrappers.
We regularly have "litter clearing" days, but b******y hell why should us geriatrics be spending a day picking up trash that shouldn't have been dropped in the first place?

All that money spent on the park in front of the swimming pool building in poole for it to be turned into a rubbish tip is just a disgusting waste of public money. As for those dropping litter, string em up that's what I say. It's the only language they understand.If a private company can get the message through that walking over to the litter bin is worth doing then good on them. The youths who use the park should have a nice place to sit and not have to fester in rubbish just because a few make it filthy.Incidentally I have seen just as many elderly people dropping litter, probably more as I have the younger generation.I'm looking forward to the bus station being cleaned up and hope that my complaint to the HSE will finally get the non smoking law enforced in this area as it is council property.

If the Council 'anticipates that 400 fines a month would be issued', why have they issued only 42 Fixed Penalty Notices in the last 2 years?
I suggest that the Council should dismiss the present Enforcement Officers and replace them with a team comprised of Shaun Robson, Head of Environmetal Services and John Bright, Strategic Director to assist with strategy.
400 x 12 x £65 would bring in an income of over £300000 and could enable them to EARN their current income. NO IFS, NO BUTTS!

On the spot fines,Great idea,but the only problems i can see is how is this going to be policed. How can a council worker or a private enforcement person force anyone to give out their personal details as i understand this can only be asked for by an officer of the law, or all they have to do is give false details.The other thing that i see will happen is the offender will just say "prove it" and where do you go from there?..

I agree the littering issue needs tidying up, but to issue fines would only serve to throw good money after bad, with extra magistrates courts costs, uncollected fines, and those failing / refusing to go to court causing far more cost than it would save.
There is no power to use any force to detain an 'offender' & one can simply exercise their right to silence & have free legal advice to rapidly cause financial meltdown.
Offenders subject to Probation could be directed to report for some street clearance work to credit their debt to society.
A nice idea in principle, but needs a lot more thought & resources before it becomes viable.

Littering is unpleasant, yes, and costs to clear up, I know, but seriously, do we want to live in a society where private enforcement staff (they are not officers, they are the staff of a business) loiter around the streets dishing out demands for money?. The concern about companies acting unreasonably is justified, if this goes ahead, watch this space for stories about people being fined for feeding the ducks in Poole Park, or whose child drops crumbs off something they are eating!

Very good points all round above in particular how would private operators insist on name and address ... below lengthy email I have sent in support to Cllr Trent and CCd to DEFRA ...

Thousands of pounds of FPNs for gross littering could be fairly recovered every week - please stand up for the clean majority in our country.

Cllr Tony Trent
Chair EOSC
Borough of Poole

Dear Cllr Trent,

I read with interest your comments and that of Head of Service in Echo today re privatising FPNs for littering.

I can understand Cllrs having reservations that privatised FPNs might go the same way as private clamping. We have direct experience of that practice for many years on Rebbeck's land behind Ashley Road central north where it has been nothing short of down right money-making entrapment on the part of land agents.

Photos attached - as you can see warning notices are as minimal and obscure as they possibly could be short of contravening all regulations in this area - consquently no end of people have been clamped, not for wilfully parking with no concern for private land, but because they had no idea that parking was not allowed and no idea clamping was in force.

The impact I know of this practice has been quite dreadful and distressing on many. I believe the pratice is now ended with legislation.

However, on the matter of comparing these highly aggressive pratices with those of private FPNs for littering I would point out clamping is £180 with an owner's car imobilised. That is of course a huge impact that has to be dealt with at the time. On the other hand private FPNs for littering are if paid up, £50. This is surely a significantly less (and proportionate) impact for an offence.

Therefor although you and others have reservations I very much hope you and colleagues will as John Sprackling suggest give this a good solid trial run. At worse our areas have at times in the past been nothing less than rivers of litter. I have photos going back from 2011 to 2004 showing how shocking littering has been yet next to no FPN's being issued. Indeed for years 2003-09 Poole in the bottom worst quartile for littering in the whole country.

I am very pleased to say street cleanliness is very much improved the past eighteen months in Ashley Road area but, none-the-less, as ESPN well know from all the litter they still collect in, source littering continues as heavily as ever. Cleansing much improved, source littering no change.

We of course on one narrative in Poole were supposed to have had a "Zero Tolerance Policy" from 2005 but that turned out to be a complete fiction. Whenever we tried to get FPN figures they were never forth coming and when we did find out they were as I see now is being agreed very low indeed.

I hope now therefore you and colleagues will action this new policy. It is understood that evidence is needed connecting the "litter offence" with an individual and that, it seems to me, not so much not easy as time consuming in surveillance (no doubt using hand cameras) but as I've said myself many times and I am sure many others know well enough there are well known identifyable black spots where adults (not under 18s) in particular are littering each and every day ..

That is, smokers outside gambling shops (not just betting shops anymore but highly adictive machine gaming), pubs and pub doorways, bus stops (Ashley bus stop drain-aways are as ever clogged with hundreds of butt ends), bank ATM machine tickets, "picnic benches" along our high streets ....

I therefor personally hope there will be no further delay (seven years now since CNEA 2005) in penalising those individuals at these sort of locations who litter with indifference and impunity. After all we the general public are the ones who are having to pay for the clean up aren't we and that mounting to millions each year. Surely that is every reason to run a fair FPN penalty system with operators accountable to council - no doubt using real time moving photos to identity the offence.

And finally Cllr, to help this whole matter on, can we not initiate a programme to encourage if not insist that every store trading in a high street provides at least one litter bin at their exit - best on the pavement outside their door ?

I find it quite astounding that whilst it is commercial outlets, most particularly fast food take-aways and bank ATMs, that are the source of a great deal of high street litter (that users throw away) very few outlets indeed provide any litter bins at all.

Can this be progressed ? In Ashley Road for instance the Post Office (no bin), the banks without exception no bins, food take-aways (very few if any with any bins), and charity shops - not one to my knowledge provides one bin. Currently the worst offending store for not cleaning up its own premises is newly arrived British Heart Foundation. I have asked them myself and appealed, three times now, but sitll they will not clear all the putrifying rubbish that accumulates in their adjacent door-way which is part of their leased premises.

And a last point, and indeed a critical key point, how can it be that a private company can take on this FPN work, cover all their costs and make no charge to council, but council's own staff in our high streets, Civil Enforcement Officers, cannot do the work cost effectively ? Why for instance doesn't council directly employ extra CEOs to carry out this work ?

In any case I very much hope the policy is actioned - I think BoP will get a huge vote of thanks from the general public. But none-the-less I can't see why it has to be private company and not BoP employed staff. After all there would then be no issue of employed CEOs (unlike private clampers) using excessive or agressive pratices.

Yours sincerely,

Jeff Williams

Jubilee Road Residents Association
Parkstone

Photos : clean parades today (as most days) we are grateful to E&CPS staff - the operator who drives the cleansing van around the car-park areas does a first rate job. Also some shots from 18 months ago - and still you can see some days when cleaning has missed an area how much litter continues to pour onto our streets. I cannot see how there can be any case, in public option, and in legislation (2005 CNEA), that a robust FPN policy is not very long overdue in Poole - real Zero Tolerance and all credit to every Cllr that will stand up for the majority who suffer the costs of the grossly littering minority.

In the photos from Jan 2011 I would say £5,000 of FPNs - and so it was for many months for many years, and still plenty of offending every day.

"consultation takes place to see how residents feel about engaging a private enforcement company to carry out litter patrols."

Another open cheque book for Poole taxpayers.

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When is the Echo going to stop this rubbish littering their website?
If they don't know how to stop it themselves, I suggest they outsource the business to some wonderful private company like Mouchel or ARS!

Believe it or not, Councillors smoke too. So perhaps Poole Council could start with their own Poole Councillors, who drop cigarette ends on the pavements and car-parks outside the council, and in the`members' area at the front of the Council building. Poole Council....get your own house in order first before you target us commoners.

As a responsible dog owner I clean up after my dog but on our road many do not. He is absolutely in agreement that this should be picked up as it is not unknown for him to push me in the road to avoid other dog's mess.
In the Ashley Cross/Poole Park area there is a lot of broken glass strewn across pavements. Even if this is reported to the council very little happens. There has been some on the corner of church road/springfield road since last Christmas. Admittedly it is now a small amount but still sufficient to cause injury to someone falling, with sandals on or to a passing animal. There are often glass bottles smashed in Poole Park by the maintenance team just gaily ignoring what is in their path.
Grass grows through cracks in the pavements and this is usually the sort that goes through dog's paws. Maybe I should start sending the council my vet bills for damaged paws and antibiotics? Add to this they are not now collecting grass cuttings which blow all over with those harmful grass seeds.
Maybe the council ought to just do its job then maybe the public would think twice about littering a tidy town.