Comment permalink

Fly-tipping near a creek in Dunedin’s Jubilee Park. PHOTO: SHAWN MCAVINUE
Fly-tipping near a creek in Dunedin’s Jubilee Park. PHOTO: SHAWN MCAVINUE
Fly-tipping needs to stop, the Dunedin City Council says.

Council waste and environmental solutions group manager Chris Henderson said the council dealt with thousands of reports of rubbish problems each year, from overflowing bins to unwanted furniture and other items of rubbish discarded on streets.

Fly-tipping – where rubbish is deliberately transported to semi-rural locations and dumped – made up 5 per cent of all illegal dumping across the city, but was still a problem which needed to stop, Mr Henderson said.

“Our city is a beautiful place – and we need to keep it that way," he said.

“That means doing the right thing by our environment and using the facilities available to everyone, from kerbside rubbish and recycling collection services, to transfer stations, skip days and the Green Island landfill.

“Everyone needs to do their bit.”

Since 2015, records show council contractors had responded to more than 6500 rubbish calls of all types, spread across the council’s transport, waste and environmental solutions and parks and recreation departments.

"Of those, 343 were specifically recorded as fly-tipping, where it is clear someone had transported waste to a location in order to dump it without being seen," Mr Henderson said.

Other callouts included a mixture of illegal dumping types, including fly-tipping, but the data did not distinguish between the different types of rubbish dumping.

“We get a lot of incidents of rubbish just being placed on the street outside someone’s house, or beside a rubbish bin, in the expectation that the DCC will eventually have to clean it up,” Mr Henderson said.

“People need to take responsibility for their waste and do the right thing.”

Earlier this month, the Associate Minister for the Environment Eugenie Sage announced a $124million Government investment in recycling infrastructure and plans to increase and expand the waste levy to divert material from landfill.

"New Zealanders are proud of our country’s clean, green reputation," Ms Sage said.

"Yet rubbish disposal to New Zealand’s municipal landfills increased by a staggering 48% in the last 10 years. We can’t allow that situation to continue.

"We need large-scale and urgent action because much of what is currently sent to New Zealand landfills could be recycled, composted or reused."

Ministry data estimates the proposed levy could increase the cost of the weekly council kerbside rubbish bag by about 25 cents, depending on individual council decisions.

Comments

View all

Some people nee to take a good look at themselves.

Maybe the DCC needs to look to itself to stop fly tipping. The charges to use the tip are exorbitant. People don't want to be ripped off when disposing of rubbish. Recycling is a complete joke, we are light years behind where we should be. So, rather than just whinging about something that will get worse due to council (and government) policies, get your act together so fly tipping doesn't need to happen.

If you think cost justifies dirty dumping. Irresponsible.

You are twisting the point that David and others are trying to make. I don't think any one of these comments are trying to justify fly tipping, but are making the point that our council needs to do more. Look at the comment Kris makes, it is a very good insight into the situation.

Stop fly-tipping: council

Stop ripping us off: ratepayer

Clearly there is a tipping point in regard to the fees charged to get rid of rubbish.

If the fees are low enough then there is less disinsentive for rubbish behaviour.

Ironically the very levy's that the government keeps putting on local government to then put on to the people as another fee / tax in order to be "clean and green" is causing the environment to be more polluted.

Have the fees at a reasonable level to enable more people to use the correct facilities and more people will do so.

Stop increasing tip charges.

I agree with David. Tip costs are too expensive. At 20 (small)-45 dollars(large) for a car load of rubbish, or 70 dollars for a station wagon, or up to 91 dollars for a trailer full of rubbish, and even for green waste, 44 dollars for a trailer load, its no wonder that this occurs

So when the council said it was putting charges at the land fill up, to make people do more recycling, the people with a brain said this will cause more people to dump rubbish or fly tipping as some consultant the council must have hired calls it,
People with a brain 1, council 0, yet again!!!

People who dump: 0 brain.

In most developed countries (cough), road side collection, in the form of wheelie bins, is free for every household. Or should I say, included in your annual rates...

Let me guess what will happen after Green Island landfill shuts down and new one opens 15 km further down the road, with increased fees

I'm constantly cleaning up rubbish dumped along my fence by thoughtless lazy people. Why do you think it is OK to make it someone else's problem to pick up after you?
Another example: dumped on Emerson St today is a blue steel bed frame and a box of plastic bottles. Hello! Its all recycleable which means FREE to take to Green Island!

the DCC has decided to have a "zero waste" policy which in green terms means "dump it back to the residents" zero waste can only happen when there is a solid infrastructure plan in place - if you go to the DCC website you will see all the right buzz words e.g. circular economy etc. which they seem to have no understanding of. if the DCC were really committed to zero waste we would have the machinery to deal with our plastic and metal lids and a compost area for the green waste even perhaps communities with a waste hub in each neighbourhood etc.. but if you read the last annual plan the DCC "is committed" to work in partnership with anyone that has an idea. Again dumping it back to the ratepayers. What must we do ? We have to lobby the DCC to make it right and encourage action - words words words im sick of words - lets have some iniative and action from DCC in this matter plse

Every week, I dutifully wash my recycling for the yellow bin.

I was horrified recently to discover by chance that the DCC currently only recycles plastics 1, 2, and 5 anyway, and that 'lids, caps and triggers sprays' are no longer recycled. Am I the only one to miss the memo regarding this, or are we all expected to look up the Council website to see what is acceptable this week? What a waste of my time to wash these items - only to have the Council throw it all out (presumably).

For the system to work it needs to be simple and consistent, otherwise the Council will lose what support they do have. Great that we are about to have fancy (and expensive) new recycling infrastructure imposed upon us, but what's the point if most of the materials are only fit for the rubbish anyhow? How does new infrastructure make us any more 'green'?

Sort it out, DCC.

View all