AQW 5810/17-22
Mr John Blair
Alliance Party
South Antrim
Tabled Date: 21/07/2020
Answered On Date: 31/07/2020
Priority Written: No
Question:
To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs what is the Northern Ireland Environment Agency doing to (i) increase the outcomes of complaints on pollution, fly-tipping, oil spills, fish kills and other environmental damage; and (ii) ensure these offences result in penalties for those responsible.
Answer:
The Northern Ireland Environment Agency (NIEA) seeks to protect the environment through a variety of proactive and reactive measures including; monitoring, the development and implementation of strategic plans, advice and regulation, supporting research, and on the ground response to combat or minimise the effects of pollution. These activities aim to reduce the risk of pollution incidents from occurring and therefore the risk of fly-tipping, fish kills, oil spills and other environmental damage. The majority of what is commonly regarded as fly-tipping (the casual, ad hoc disposal of small scale wastes) is primarily the responsibility of local Councils. The NIEA's Enforcement Branch may investigate, and enforce against larger scale, higher risk, fly-tipping incidents involving hazardous wastes and quantities of waste material over 20m3 by volume. Enforcement branch also works closely with other agencies including councils, PSNI and NIFRS to help best address illegal dumping; in 2019-20 it contributed to 12 Council led multi-agency meetings to help address Environmental and Health issues relating to traditional bonfires. Earlier this year, as a proactive measure aimed at combatting fly-tipping and littering, the Department has issued a series of communications. A flyer was sent to every household in Northern Ireland with details of how to manage waste and recycling during the Covid 19 crisis, which included sections on fly-tipping. There have also been radio adverts on local stations throughout May 2020 and a range of social media posts on various platforms continuing into June, highlighting the problems of fly-tipping, littering, illegal waste dumping, and pollution in our waterways Pollution of our valuable water, air and land resource is both environmentally and economically damaging. Taking simple pro-active steps to prevent pollution, or reduce the risk of pollution at its source not only serves to protect the environment through greater regulatory compliance, but is cost effective in terms of clean-up costs, fines from penalties and reputational damage. There is a duty on us all to help protect our environment and I would encourage all citizens to continue to report incidents of pollution and environmental damage to NIEA as soon as it is observed. This can be done using the 24/7 hotline 0800 807060. All cases of pollution are robustly investigated and where the polluter can be identified NIEA will pursue formal Enforcement Action in line with the enforcement policy for significant breaches in legislation. NIEA takes a graduated risk based approach to the enforcement of pollution, from providing proactive advice and working with those responsible to resolve issues, to formal enforcement including waste clearance notices, fixed penalty notices, and the preparation of enforcement files for the Public Prosecution Service. The level of fines levied in the courts as you are aware is a matter for the Judiciary. There are current sentencing guidelines which are available to Magistrates to provide for a consistent approach to sentencing.
|