Disgusted residents are facing "abominable" scenes as streets are overrun with rats and piles of rubbish.
Roxy Ruane is just one woman who has hit out at fly-tipping in the city region as she urged people to have more respect for where they live. After buying her home in 2018, she said it is not what she thought it would be.
Speaking to the ECHO, Roxy - who lives on Bartlett Street in Wavertree - said: "It's awful, we are living in squalor."
She added: "You can't move because of the amount of rubbish and it's not just fly-tipping. It's constant. The more fly-tipping, the more we see rats. Our alleyway is disgusting, there's mattresses, dead animals, it's abominable."
But it's not just Wavertree residents complaining of piles of rubbish. Over in Norris Green, one nan caught a group of fly tippers red handed as they dumped "at least 12 mattresses" onto the side of a road as she said: "It infuriated me because dumping wooden items for a bonfire is one thing but mattresses give off toxic fumes".
The ECHO asked Liverpool City Council just how many fly-tipping reports have been received in recent years and how many fines have been issued. Freedom of Information data has revealed that for the council to remove fly-tipped waste, it costs around £780k annually.
The FOI data also showed that in 2022, from January to October, a total of 14,949 fly tipping reports were made to Liverpool city council. This was compared to 12,950 in 2021. In terms of fines, in 2020, a total of 21 fines were issued in Liverpool as a result of fly-tipping. This was compared to 15 in 2021 and 15 in 2022 from January to November.
Previously, the ECHO reported how residents were "living in squalor" as streets were overrun with rubbish, rats and "plague water". In response, a spokesperson for Liverpool City Council said fly-tipping is taken seriously, adding: "The council has invested in a new generation of CCTV at a number of hotspots and as a result is currently investigating 40 incidents, of which the offenders in half of these are in the process of being fined."
They added: "We also have an enforcement team operating three days a week checking these streets and the wider area and we would again encourage any residents to liaise with our community wardens or report any incidents online."
The ECHO previously reported that Liverpool Council will now consider cases of dumped waste and fly-tipping around the city as "crime scenes" in a major new crackdown. Dressed in crime scene tape, the highly visual approach is being used to highlight the cost and to remind residents they are breaking the law if they dump materials in public locations.
As part of phase one of the new campaign, the City Council launched a ‘shame’ approach at the start of November across all of its social media channels, utilising imagery from a new generation of CCTV cameras it has installed. The sharing of images of offenders caught in the act is being used to make residents aware that the council is watching those who illegally fly tip and is taking action to hold them responsible.
We asked the council what were the top 10 streets where fly-tipping occurs, which revealed:
- West Derby Road
- Liberty Street
- Cranborne Road
- Prescot Road
- Hampson Street
- Longfellow Street
- Orwell Road
- Lower Breck Road
- Dalemeadow Road
- Vining Street
Visiting some of these streets, many residents all said the same - that they were "disgusted" and "frustrated". One woman, who did not wish to be named, said: "Honestly it's like you go round in circles. People have no respect these days but it's where you live. I won't let my kids play out, it's not hygienic."
Roxy Ruane, of Bartlett Street, told the ECHO: "There's no reason for you not to put it in the bin. It's not hygienic, people have kids. People go on about Covid can kill, but we have rats and plague water down our street."
According to Freedom of Information data, for 2021 and 2022 to date, two successful prosecutions for fly-tipping were made by the council. Joanne Anderson, Mayor of Liverpool, who is also the Cabinet lead for Waste Management in the city, previously said: "We’re serious about tackling fly-tipping here in Liverpool and that’s why we have launched our new campaign to ensure we are making our neighbourhoods cleaner.
"Fly-tipping and other types of waste crime ruin our neighbourhoods and environment, and everyone has a responsibility to ensure that waste is disposed of legally and safely. This means making sure that anyone who is handling your waste is licensed to do so, it is also important you know where your waste will end up, otherwise you run the risk of receiving a £400 fine or even in some cases, legal action.
"To support phase two of our campaign, we are in the process of recruiting five new enforcement officers to provide additional support in tackling the issue and significantly reducing the number of fly-tipping incidents in our city."
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