The campaign group North Wales Against Kingdom Security is helping two smokers who were fined for putting lit cigarettes on the ground for a moment. In one case, a bus driver got off the coach and lit a cigarette outside the door. An elderly gentleman wanted to come down the stairs, so the bus driver put his cigarette on the floor, and helped the man off. He then picked the cigarette and finished it but an operative leapt in and issued him a fixed penalty notice in the meantime. In another case, a lady (who is is disabled and uses a mobility…

Now Rother Council has joined Camden Council in fining members of the public for putting their rubbish in the bin. A woman in Battle, East Sussex, picked up waste that had been strewn over a council carpark after seagulls ripped open bin bags. Because she put the rubbish in the carpark bins, she was sent a £400 pound fine for ‘fly tipping’. Like Camden, Rother Council subcontracts enforcement to a private company, who is paid per fine (in this case, the company is National Enforcement Solutions). At worst, the lady made a well-intentioned mistake of putting rubbish in the nearby bins. By…

John Pointing is a barrister and David Horrocks is a chartered Environmental Health Practitioner; together they run Statutory Nuisance Solutions. They have decades of experience in the environmental health field, and co-authored the Chartered Institute of Environmental Health guidance on Community Protection Notices. What follows is an edited transcript of an interview with John and David, in which the discuss the trouble with CPNs, the reasons for the falling standards in local authority enforcement, and what needs to be done. What is the background to the changes in environmental health enforcement? The shift in Environmental Health enforcement started to occur around 2003,…

We are delighted that the Association of Liberal Democrat Councillors has decided to take a stand against ‘fining for profit’. Drawing on Manifesto Club work on the area, the ALDC has produced a Campaign pack and a Draft Council motion on the issue. These are only available to its members, but the council motion can be viewed here. If you are in an area where private enforcement companies operate on commission, you could contact Lib Dem councillors and ask if they will challenge these practices, pointing them towards these excellent ALDC resources. (Of course, the council motion might be of interest to…

We have been contacted by a Camden pensioner who was slapped with a fine for ‘fly tipping’, after she swept part of her street and put the litter in a bin over the road. Her street was filthy and had not been cleaned for a week. She swept up the street litter – largely cigarette butts and sweet wrappers – from outside her house and the house of her elderly neighbour, and put the half carrier bag of rubbish in the bins over the road. As a reward for her efforts, Camden Council sent her a bill for £400 pounds, and a…