Will the Cabinet Secretary outline how much money the Welsh Government allocates to tackling fly-tipping?
Our aim is to prevent fly-tipping from occurring in the first place by seeking to change public attitudes and behaviour through education, partnership working and enforcement programmes. To help achieve this we provide ongoing financial support for Fly-tipping Action Wales (FtAW), a programme run by Natural Resources Wales.
FtAW’s current campaign “It’s your Duty to Care”, achieved its widest reach yet in 2023, with a digital reach of 3.5 million and nearly 500,000 people engaging with it through adverts on social media and radio. This Welsh Government funded campaign has helped raised awareness of the legal responsibility on householders to check whether a waste carrier has a licence before passing their waste to them. FtAW also provides training and guidance, facilitates the sharing of best practice and develops toolkits for awareness raising campaigns.
We have also previously supported Keep Wales Tidy’s “Not Up My Street” campaign which focused on students and social landlords to raise awareness and deter fly-tipping. As part of our ongoing funding of Keep Wales Tidy we continue to support volunteers and community groups in removing and preventing litter and fly-tipping in their areas.
In 2022 we increased funding for the programme to £1.2 million over a three-year period (from 1 April 2022 to 31 March 2025). This has allowed FtAW to build upon its previous successes and enabled them to employ two dedicated officers to support landowners with enforcement activity. This has already led to several successful prosecutions and other enforcement actions.
I intend to write to Senedd Members prior to the summer recess to outline my priorities for tackling litter and fly-tipping for the remaining Senedd term.