Help us to beat the fly-tippers
THE claim by St George's ward Labour council candidates that fly-tipping has doubled is nonsense. According to Government figures, fly-tipping in Islington has actually gone down slightly.
The Environment Agency has however shown a rise in large-scale dumping of lorry-loads of waste by unscrupulous businesses and criminal gangs. There has been a recent spate of fly-tipping involving tyres. Sometimes it even involves fuel or chemicals.
We don't put out skips for these criminal gangs to use at taxpayers' expense. We catch and prosecute them. Does Labour want Islington to become a magnet for criminals all over London to come and dump their industrial waste and leave it in skips on our street corners?
I would urge all members of the public to report fly-tipping if you see it. Islington's streets are getting cleaner, but the council needs help from the community for us to keep improving. Once a fly-tip is reported to the council, it now usually takes just one day to be cleaned up.
Anything left in a skip usually has to go to landfill - not only an environmental disaster, but costing Landfill Taxes. With the council's bulky waste collection, we do recycle everything we can. And decent furniture is given to the Homestore charity for reuse, helping low-income families get access to affordable furniture.
We have had less than a handful of requests for the return of council skips, stinking out street corners. The council offers everyone free collection of 25 bulky items every year. Residents tell us that they prefer the free, personalised service brought in by the Liberal Democrats, because it is more convenient and more environmentally-friendly. - Councillor Greg Foxsmith, executive member for the environment, Liberal Democrat, Town Hall, Upper Street, N1.
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