Annual review

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Surrey Environment Partnership
April 2020 – March 2021

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Activity and achievements 2020-21

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Reducing fly-tipping

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Fly-tipping is the illegal deposit of waste on land or in water. Local authorities and landowners are responsible for clearing it up and it is punishable by a fine of up to £50,000, or 12 months imprisonment if convicted in a Magistrates’ Court. If convicted in a Crown Court, it can be punishable by an unlimited fine and up to five years imprisonment. Other penalties include fixed penalty notices between £150-400 and seizure of a vehicle and/or its contents.

Surrey’s fly-tipping strategy includes three aims:

• Stimulate a change in behaviour among residents, businesses and landowners that helps reduce the amount of fly-tipping in Surrey.
• Jointly agree the most efficient process for reporting, collection and disposal of illegally dumped waste on public land.
• Work together to maximise investigation and enforcement resources to ensure we use these in the most cost-effective way.

Activity undertaken as part of the 2020-21 programme has focused on strengthening enforcement and changing behaviours through education.

Strengthening enforcement

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The Fly-tipping Enforcement Officers Group continued to meet regularly for partners to share intelligence, best practice and resources to reduce fly-tipping. Representatives from both Surrey Police and the Environment Agency attend the meetings as well as SEP partner authorities.

A pilot task force in Runnymede has been started in conjunction with Surrey Police to tackle fly-tipping activity that is recognised as Serious and Organised Crime. £10,000 of funding was secured from the Police and Crime Commissioner for this work.

A vehicle seizure training session for enforcement teams and partner agencies took place on 2 and 3 February 2021. The training had 30 officers in attendance and was very well received. Additionally, some budget was carried forward to 2021-22 to fund a partnership problem solving training session that was originally due to take place in 2020, and to help support the task force pilot.

Changing behaviours

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The fly-tipping communications campaign in 2020-21 aimed to stimulate and sustain a change in attitude and behaviour among residents and businesses to help reduce fly-tipping in Surrey. The objectives were to educate residents and businesses about their responsibilities when disposing of waste and highlight the consequences of fly-tipping and convictions that have taken place.

Communications work was undertaken throughout the year to share social media content when partners had relevant news to share. However, communications activities increased during two main phases of the campaign when levels of fly-tipping are known to spike – in August and September 2020 and March 2021.

Phase one of the campaign used refreshed artwork from the 2019-20 campaign, which had evaluated well previously. Phase two of the campaign took place during March 2021 and used edited versions of the SCRAP artwork developed by Hertfordshire County Council.

Both phases used tactics including print, radio and digital advertising, alongside social media activity. Phase two also included an advertorial in the Surrey Advertiser newspaper and on the Surrey Live website.

Residents engaged well with the messages and independent research commissioned after phase two showed some positive results.

Evaluation highlights

• More than 23,000 views of SEP’s fly-tipping webpages.
• Digital adverts seen over 3.7 million times.
• Campaign films viewed over 32,000 times.
• Highest ever awareness of a fly-tipping campaign at 49% (up from 41% in 2019-20).
• 65% of residents said the campaign deters people from fly-tipping.
• 63% said it increased their understanding of their responsibilities when disposing of household and
  construction waste.