The recent acquittal of a suspected fly-tipper shows that prosecutions need to be “watertight”, councillors have been told.
At a meeting of Bradford Council’s Bradford East Area Committee on Thursday, officers were asked what enforcement was being done around fly-tipping in the constituency.
One councillor said there was a fear that fly-tipping in some areas could become “the norm” if the public believed fly-tippers were not being punished.
The committee was given an update on street cleansing in the constituency, and heard that in Bradford East, there had been 2,992 reports of fly tipping in 2024/25.
This was up from 2023/24, when there were 2,693 reports.
Of these, 1,121 were in the Little Horton ward.
CCTV cameras have been deployed in areas that suffer from repeated fly- tipping.
At the meeting Councillor Rizwana Jamil (Lab, Bowling and Barkerend) said: “Every ward in the district has hot spots for fly-tipping that are the bane of our lives.
“The criticism we get as councillors is the seeming lack of enforcement.
“People are so used to fly-tipping in certain bits, and they know the Council will pick it up, but there is no enforcement.
“What are we doing to increase enforcement? We need to take action against persistent fly-tippers so there is a deterrent, rather than fly-tipping becoming something that becomes the norm.”
Catherine Smith, Bradford Council’s street cleansing and parks service manager, acknowledged the enforcement team had been reduced in recent years due to budget cuts.
But she added: “We investigate every report of fly-tipping that comes in.
“Sometimes we are limited in what we can say about cases that are ongoing, and it may look like we are not doing anything.
“We have had some successful court cases recently.
“The problem is, when you prosecute someone the case has to be watertight.
“There was recently a court case you might have seen in the T&A. The court was shown CCTV footage of the fly-tipping, evidence from officers and information from this individual’s Facebook page.”
But she said because the footage was “slightly grainy” the individual was found not guilty.
Mrs Smith added: “You have to have water-tight evidence if you plan on prosecuting someone.
“We do everything we can with the resources we’ve got.”
A number of fly-tipping cases are due to proceed through the courts in the coming weeks.
