Fly tippers hate being exposed

How to end fly tipping

FLY TIPPERS HATE BEING exposed

People don’t fly tip when they know their discarded items will, within a day or two, be on view to everyone in their area.

Flytips are uploaded for all to see.png

Fly tippers suffer from photophobia - they like to operate in the dark. Unfortunately for them we shine a light on them, exposing them to the hard glare of society - what behavioural scientists call a “social incentive”. (Grasmick, Bursik & Kinsey, 1991)

Our scheme has been shown to work in our pilot parish where tippers have been apprehended and fly tipping is now no longer a problem. If people know that there is a real chance of getting a fine, they do not do it. (CleanUp Britain, 2016)

It’s relatively easy to trace a fly tip back to its source so, once word of our scheme gets out, a would-be tipper or egregious local litterer begins to feel a sense of unease. And we can all begin to relax and enjoy a pristine parish.

Here’s what you need to do

On seeing a fly tip, take one or more photos and text/email them to us together with the name of the road where the tip is located and any other relevant details. We upload it all to your Parish Log.

Residents of adjoining parishes help you solve your fly tip problem.

Your Parish Log is easily accessible on our domain or via a customised QR code on posters that we give you to display in your parish. Anyone can browse your Parish Log and send us any intel - anonymously if preferred. You can browse your neighbouring parish logs and help to identify rubbish you recognise as coming from your parish.

The key to success is that potential fly tippers are anxious the items they dump will point to them. They know the sort of stuff that is fly tipped is traceable. Their discomfort comes from the presence of the posters, the fact that every fly tip is displayed online to their own and neighbouring parishes, and our relentless determination to pursue offenders.

Here’s what we do

Apart from uploading your fly tip information to your Parish Log, we inform the appropriate authority to get the tip removed and, where there is evidence, the suspect prosecuted. We undertake these reporting and chasing tasks in order to build a central dossier on the responsiveness of the authorities, which we use to lobby government, in particular, to get the police to issue a fixed penalty notice when an offender’s identity is known.

Our approach is scientific, informed by decades working in culture change.

We know roughly where your fly tipper lives. Whereas single items of litter in your parish may have been discarded by people from far away, large amounts of rubbish tend to be dumped by fly tippers as near to their home territory as possible.

This allows us to shift the fly tipping culture through using local channels to make it known throughout the neighbourhood that the cloak of secrecy has been stripped away.

We know that, unlike littering, fly tipping is a thoughtful process - it needs to be planned. So, through getting the word about locally, we interject an unsettling idea (hi-vis jackets at the front door) into the thought process.

Subscribe to end fly tipping

The subscription for our service is £6 per month. A subscription can be taken out by a citizen or by a parish council. In return, you will benefit from a system that shifts the balance of power from fly tippers to you. No longer will they be able to rely on being anonymous - they will have to factor in the likelihood of exposure. The features are of the system are:

  • A Fly Tip Log for your Parish on the Eden Domain

  • Prompt Upload of your Fly Tip Photos to your Parish Fly Tip Log

  • A5 Posters with a QR Code pointing to your Log for your Parish and all Neighbouring Parishes

  • Fly Tip Removal Arranged with Your Council

  • Prosecutions Encouraged and Followed up

  • Your Parish Fly Tip Log Updated with Penalties Levied

  • An Advisory Service and Help Line

In addition to flytips, you can report corporate malfeasance (see OPENREACH REBUKED below), car registration numbers on receipts (CAR REG MV19 UDG), vandalism (DAMAGE REPAIRED), lost property (BRACELET FOUND), and litterers where there is identification (CULPRIT FINED/CAUTIONED).

The sooner you pin up the posters, the sooner you will see results!