Kirklees Council

Councils have a statutory duty to collect fly tipping.  Most authorities collect fly tipping in various ways depending on the location and type of material.  For example, housing associations have caretakers who clean up fly tipping on their properties, and the street cleansing team will collect fly tipping whilst out on litter patrol – this is two of nine different teams in Kirklees Council that collect fly tipping whilst out doing other work.  In order to manage operational efficiencies, these examples are common practice in many local authorities.  Each team has its own process for collecting and recording fly tipping.  Part of our obligation is to record fly tipping on WasteDataFlow (WDF) – a digital system hosted by DEFRA.  Quite often records for authorities across England vary due to the reasons mentioned above.  Whilst DEFRA have clear definitions for fly tipping, the variation of operational processes in each authority, whilst delivering on operational efficiency, does not deliver consistency in data reporting. 

We have already identified the different teams in our authority that collect fly tipping.  We now want to:

• process map all collection methods
• Complete a cost benefit analysis of each collection method, particularly identifying and evaluating impacts on residents

We want to understand whether we can create:

• consistency in recording fly tipping
• a mobile digital system used by various stakeholders (eg. residents) to better manage fly tipping.
• a system that we can replicate across different Council services
• a cleaner environment for residents with less fly tipping