somerset suffers from excess fly tipping as cuts are made to waste and recycling budget

Fly-tipping across Somerset has increased significantly due to massive cuts in waste and recycling around the county.

Somerset County Council cut costs in their waste and recycling budget in April 2011, which resulted in the closure of many waste and recycling centres during two and half days a week.

Since the budget cuts were made fly-tipping rose by 54% during the months following the cuts, with 20% of the rise in Mendip alone.

Materials that cost to recycle are being fly-tipped regularly, such as hard core and tyre dumping, which increased by 37% over the last year.

Dumping of household rubbish, green waste and electrical good is also on the up, with the council’s data showing that there has been a 50% rise in Mendip incidents in July/August 2012 alone. This is compared data from the same months in 2010 and 2011.

The evidence suggests that the budget cuts have hit the county hard and the increase in fly-tipping is very likely to be caused by the changes made back in April 2011.

Skip hire is a handy way to deal with excess waste and recycling and enclosed skips are ideal for preventing passersby from illegally fly-tipping waste into skips.