My letter to local newspapers is below,

Dear Editor,

It has been two years now since Conservative run Somerset County Council cut the waste and recycling budget to such an extent that all household recycling centres were forced to close on 2 days and week and on Sunday afternoons, and new charges were introduced for some items and for entry to smaller sites.  Last year we found out that flytipping rose by over 50% across Somerset in the year after.

Flytipping statistics for the last 12 months have just been made available. These show that across Somerset there were 40% more flytipping incidents in the past year than the year before the cuts.

The increase is worse in South Somerset (81% more), Taunton Deane (59% more) and Sedgemoor (36% more) than in Mendip (16% more) and West Somerset (small fall). Mendip and South Somerset districts are the worst parts of Somerset for flytipping with over 1,600 incidents a year.  (Please see the bar charts and tables attached, this data is ‘draft’ and not yet published by Somerset Waste Partnership, but these are official figures).

Everyone can help stop this environmental crime, by informing your District Council (Mendip’s number is 01749 648999) of any flytips or flytipping activity, and by making sure that any contractors taking waste away from your property are properly registered Waste Carriers (by asking them, or calling the Environment Agency on 0370 8506506) as unregistered cowboys are more likely to dump it than recycle it or dispose of it properly.  

But we also need to stop the ruling Conservatives in Somerset getting away with such a bad policy. They were warned by many councillors and MPs that making it more difficult and expensive for people to recycle would increase flytipping, and it still has, 2 years later. It is no ‘temporary blip’.  Conservative councillors still deny this, and voted down numerous Lib Dem attempts to change their policy, including by myself and Sam Phripp at Mendip last autumn, and at Somerset in December.

So I just really hope that we will have a new County Council that can sort this mess out after Somerset votes on May 2^nd. It is now our only chance to do something about this.

For further information please see www.adamboyden.mycouncillor.org.uk or contact me on cllr.boyden@mendip.gov.uk.

Adam Boyden

Mendip District Councillor, Frome College ward, Liberal Democrat

Mendip District Council Shadow Portfolio Holder for Governance, Assets and Public Spaces

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