The government has announced a Burnham Unveils Key Fly-Tipping Strategy to tackle illegal waste dumping across Britain.
It includes raising the maximum fine for those found to have dumped waste illegally, and granting more power to regional mayors and local council leaders.
A statement from the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA), also announced that the government will directly fund clean-up operations at three “super sites”.
Prime Minister Andy Burnham echoed his first speech as Labour Leader, when he said he hoped his fly-tipping strategy will “bring hope back to Britain’s communities.
Fly-Tipping Strategy: What Has Been Announced?
The new fly-tipping strategy was announced jointly by Burnham and Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, Angela Eagle.
The statement said that DEFRA will focus on “better use of drones, a bigger role for the police and the National Crime Agency, more Environmental Agency (EA) officers on the front line, and a steep rise in fines”.
Eagle herself will chair a new Waste Crime Crackdown Group, which aims to unite environmental regulators, such as the EA, with local law enforcement teams.
She said that the government were “cleaning up sites, but we are also stopping the cycle, driving faster prevention and disruption, better intelligence, and stronger coordination across the system.”
Police officers will now be given access to AI-controlled drones, which are designed to detect illegal waste dumping as it happens. It is hoped that this will allow officers to respond more quickly to illegal activity.
On top of this, the maximum fine for individual found to be dumping waste illegally will rise from £300 to £5,000.
“The days of making easy money out of waste are over” the Prime Minister said in Wednesday’s announcement.
Burnham’s fly-tipping strategy builds on the measures set out by Keir Starmer’s government in March’s Waste Crime Action Plan.
These included the introduction of digital waste tracking, to allow law enforcement officers to better understand the methods used by organised waste dumping gangs. As well as the creation of the Online Waste Hub, which provides the public with information on the EA’s efforts to reduce illegal waste dumping.
The Scale of the Problem
The EA’s National Waste Crime Survey, published in July 2025, estimated that roughly 20% of all UK waste was being managed illegally.
87% of farmers and landowners surveyed reported being affected by small scale fly-tipping, with 21% saying they had been affected by large scale fly-tipping.
The problem of large scale fly-tipping was made even more apparent by a BBC investigation from March this year.
This research identified 11 “super sites”, where 20,000 tonnes or more of rubbish had been dumped illegally, including one in Andy Burnham’s own constituency of Makerfield.
While the clear-up operation at this specific site has already received government funding, reports from the Guardian suggest that locals are unimpressed with the progress made so far.
The EA hopes that Burnham’s own fly-tipping strategy will yield more success.
“By strengthening our intelligence and analysis capability” said EA Chief Executive Philip Duffy, “EA teams will be better placed to stay well ahead of the criminals behind this activity and support the recover of the places we call home.”
Reducing the scale of illegal waste disposal may also bring financial benefits to the government, with landfill tax evasion costing the government an estimated £150 million in 2023-24.
The Regional Perspective
The new fly-tipping strategy is another area Burnham has identified as being an opportunity to devolve power to regional mayors.
The Mayors of West Yorkshire (Tracy Brabin, Labour) and Greater Manchester (Bev Craig, Labour) will reportedly be the first to be involved with the “new region-led approaches to waste crime”.
These will “give Mayors and council leaders the lead in co-ordinating councils, police, regulators, and other enforcement agencies” says DEFRA, “with decisions driven by regional intelligence and by the communities worst affected.
Burnham’s fly-tipping strategy also includes specific plans to deal with three of the “super sites” identified by the BBC.
Waste sites at: Power Station Road, Isle of Sheppey, Kent; Aymer Close, Runnymede, Surrey; and Midland Road, Bradford, West Yorkshire, will all receive direct funding towards their clean-up operations.
DEFRA says these sites were chosen based on “scale, risk to nearby communities, environmental damage, and links to persistent non-compliance and organised waste crime.”
Final Thought
Efforts to reduce illegal waste dumping, and improve the living conditions of people in the worst affected areas, are something a vast majority of the public can support.
This will only remain the case though, if they prove to be effective.
Burnham’s decision to announce the fly-tipping strategy so soon after the Waste Crime Action Plan shows both an acknowledgment of the need for urgent and decisive action, as well as a lack of faith in the pre-existing measures.
The emphasis on the devolution aspects of the strategy also represents Burnham’s commitment to empowering regional mayors. This must however be balanced against the need for the government to maintain control over such an important and ambitious scheme.
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