Litter and Graffiti
41. While a good proportion of fly-tipping, certainly
the larger-scale incidents or those involving hazardous waste,
are motivated by commercial gain (or desire to avoid direct costs);
and fly-posting, as illegal commercial advertisement, is likewise
a matter of profit and gain; litter and graffiti is generally
casual blight conducted out of laziness, spite or the desire to
self-publicise. As we have seen, in some areas graffiti is beginning
to cross over the line into a commercial, profitable business
recruited to advertise products or events. Generally, however,
it remains the unprofitable entertainment of those who despise
the law. Both litter and graffiti, because often undertaken casually,
quickly become habitual and lead to local environmental blight.
Both are more particularly urban phenomena, and the former is
especially connected to fast food and shopping outlets.
42. During the inquiry, evidence was presented to
us that suggested that, on the one hand, there is an increasing
amount of litter on the streets and that graffiti is an ever-growing
presence to those living particularly in the poorer parts of our
cities and towns; and, on the other hand, that the evidence for
this real growth across the country was possibly illusory, as
the rise in interest in local environmental quality and the growing
tendency for individuals to complain distorted what was essentially
a static picture. Certainly there is evidence that there is an
increasing number of complaints about litter and graffiti, and
it is possible that this is accompanied by a cultural acceptance
of low-level littering and graffiti amongst certain sectors of
the population—youth in particular. Probably as a result
of a growing awareness and a rise in the number of complaints,
it is now the case that local environmental quality is higher
up the agenda in government, nationally and locally, than it was
a decade ago.
43. In other words, the picture is not a clear one.
EnCams' Local Environmental Quality Survey is too new a survey
to assist us in determining any real trends over the last decade
or so—although it does, for example, point to a decline
in dog faeces on our streets and in our parks, which it claims
is due to successful campaigning involving TV celebrities on the
basis of its threat to health. While disagreements persist as
to whether the country is getting increasingly litter and graffiti-strewn,
or whether we are just more aware of it and impatient about it,
it is obvious that littering in particular is a pretty mainstream
activity which easily becomes habitual and which can yet devastate
the visual appeal of a place.
44. What ought to engage the government's mind, local
and national, even more is that local environmental conditions
appear to have a direct bearing upon levels of crime. While increasing
levels of litter and graffiti lead at first, through complacency,
to more of the same and to augmented levels of general anti-social
behaviour and low-level crime, it seems well understood that continuing
local degradation of the environment will lead ineluctably to
more serious crime. There does indeed appear to be a link between
litter and graffiti on the one hand and drug-peddling, muggings
and burglary on the other. This is commonly known as the "broken
windows theory", and while it may not command unanimous support
it is seen clearly to correspond to reality as seen by local authorities,
police forces and people across the country.
45. Leeds City Council told us how improvements to
the local environment in Headingley within Leeds coincided with
a reduction in the annual number of burglaries. Jan Berry, Chairman
of the Police Federation, said that there has been "a huge
amount of research over the years that demonstrates that if something
looks neat and tidy people think twice about damaging that. However,
once it is damaged it escalates very quickly."[48]
Louise Casey, National Director of the Anti-Social Behaviour
Unit gave her personal view that there was a link between local
environmental conditions, their continuing degradation and with
rising crime.[49] Crime-fighting
may be as much about enforcing the law against those who litter
and daub graffiti across our cities as about putting more bobbies
on the beat.
46. Of course, enforcement of the law is key. Much
of the fight against litter and graffiti can be carried out at
a low level. Casual litterers can be humiliated and shamed into
better behaviour and, if necessary, fined—but to do this
requires those willing and able to do this difficult duty. In
this context, local authorities and central government are increasingly
relying not just upon more local patrols by police officers but
also upon the new breed of community support officers and neighbourhood
wardens whose uniformed presence is vital in terms of both deterrence
and enforcement. As Louise Casey explained to the Committee:
"Where you see street wardens and neighbourhood wardens on
estates , one of the things they get to grips with… is just
raising the level of rule-making… That is a good thing."[50]
Despite some reservations from the Police Federation,[51]
it is clear that anti-social
behaviour in general, and litter and graffiti in particular, have
become so prevalent, and people's fear of violence or abuse from
its perpetrators so great, that Police Community Support Officers
and other such uniformed community representatives must now play
a major role.
47. In some areas, such as litter from fast food
outlets, collaboration with business may also pay dividends Fast
food litter is a growing problem in our towns and cities. Its
prevalence has risen by 12% in the year between 2002 and 2003
alone.[52] We are aware
that EnCams is working on a code of conduct for fast-food outlets
in terms of their management of litter with local authorities.
This national scheme follows on from some successful protocols
agreed in cities across the country, in Stoke-on-Trent, for example.
However, we have also been made aware that some local authorities
consider the draft code to be overlong and over-complex and unlikely
to result in a significant lessening of such litter. Most of
the major fast-food outlets act responsibly with regard to litter
(although there are still issues of irresponsible and excessive
packaging which we will not touch upon in this Report): the greater
problem is with smaller outlets and franchises which fail to meet
due standards of responsibility with regard to litter from their
products.[53] Local
authorities are the proper bodies to deal locally with those businesses
that they know are the greatest sources of litter. A national
code of conduct may be useful for those national chains which
are centrally managed: more straightforward local codes are however
in all probability the better way to progress litter minimisation
for smaller businesses and franchises across our cities and towns.
48. And it is with local authorities that much of
the responsibility for the historic levels of local environmental
degradation belongs. No area of a town or city turns overnight
into the blighted landscape of litter, graffiti and fly-posting
with which so many of the inhabitants of England and Wales are
confronted each day. Local councils were slow and sporadic in
their attempts to deal with the declining state of the environment
for which they were responsible. As Alan Woods of EnCams stressed,
"most improvements to day-to-day service delivery can be
implemented within existing resources, using a structured approach".[54]
The failure of local authorities was not due to an absence of
cash, but to an absence of will and resolve. Councils, such as
Leeds, that have in recent years seriously begun to tackle environmental
blight have not done so by throwing money at the problems they
encounter but by dedicating themselves to the struggle to improve
neighbourhood standards, and by better co-ordinating their services
internally and with external agencies and national government
as appropriate. A policy of zero tolerance for litter, graffiti
and like offences has been adopted: not sporadic and occasional
outbursts of activity but a general strategic plan to mainstream
environmental improvements across the council and its activities.
49. Local authorities must bend themselves with greater
enthusiasm to tackle local environmental blight. Those councils
which are already proving to be models of best practice, like
Leeds and Blackburn with Darwen, are beginning to reap the dividends.
Degraded localities were in part a result of distracted or unsympathetic
councils. Certainly, central government needs to look at how
better to equip local authorities for this task: in some instances,
increased resources may be necessary. But much, if not
all, can be done to combat litter and graffiti with existing powers
and within existing resources. We
call upon all local authorities to dedicate themselves to local
environmental renewal which has to be begun by tackling those
offences which are dragging down local environmental standards.
We expect the Local Government Association to play an increasing
part in spreading good practice in these areas and in spearheading
the co-operative activity of councils across the country in tackling
this blight.
48 Q197. Back
49
Qq4-5. Back
50
Q29. Back
51
Q196. Back
52
Ev11. Back
53
Qq55-9. Back
54
Ev9, 4.1. Back
|
