Are our roadsides illustrating the general state of affairs in the UK?
Littering across the UK’s road network has reached new levels and is prompting calls for stronger campaigns and enforcement of laws and regulations about littering and fly-tipping.


In the bin




In March this year a new campaign was launched supported by a host of MPs. It came as Clean Up Britain founder John Read, described the problem as a “tsunami” of littering, claiming motorway drivers were the “worst offenders”.Haunched an action plan calling for the introduction of £1,000 littering fines (up from £150) and for six penalty points on the driver’s licence.


John Read, the group’s Founder, said: “We go around the country, and we film motorways and major A roads just to show the public because this is the important thing – the British public need to see what a disgusting, filthy, rancid country they live in. It’s really sad to say that but it’s true.


“And we seem to lost our pride and respect in Britain. We need desperately to get it back because at the moment the country looks like an open cast tip. It really does, it looks like a rubbish bin. We can do so much better than that, but we need to start really understanding it’s a major problem.”








Dismal data


Keep Britain Tidy estimates that around two million pieces of rubbish are dropped every day in the UK, costing taxpayers an annual bill of £1bn for street cleaning.


Data released by the Government last month meanwhile revealed councils in England dealt with 1.13million fly-tipping incidents in 2020/21 – a 16% rise from the year before – with roadsides by far the most common place for criminals to dump rubbish.


But the number of court fines for fly-tippers in the same year more than halved, clawing back just £440k of the £11.6m spent cleaning up the largest loads.








Past its sell by date


Now the RAC Foundation has raised the issue again, stating we are at a ‘point of no return’ with uncollected litter piling up on the side of the roads, and becoming embedded in the landscape.


Steve Gooding, Director of the foundation, said: “In 1,000 years, we risk archaeologists digging up the past and identifying the 21st-century road network not by the buried tarmac but by the lines of litter that bordered it.”


Responsibility for maintaining the motorways and keeping them free of litter falls on National Highways.


Freda Rashdi, of National Highways, says: “Littering is a social problem and we’re working hard to tackle it on our roads.


“It includes using CCTV in A-road lay-bys to gather evidence to provide to local authorities, who can carry out enforcement.


“We’re also carrying out a trial to understand how message signs resonate with drivers to reduce motorway littering.”


Drivers can report littering on the roads to National Highways.








Back to the future


In March, MPs called for action to take place and stating that there is a “crystal clear legal obligation on National Highways to ensure roads are kept clear of litter”. 


Their motion continued  and called on “National Highways to act on this obligation, use motorway gantries to promote anti-littering messaging, ensure staff and contractors remove signs, sandbags and cones following roadworks in a timely manner and ensure contracts include financial penalties for not doing so.”


However, little seems to have been improved and, anecdotally, it seems the problem is getting worse.






Conservative MP for Hemel Hempstead, Sir Mike Penning, is leading the renewed calls for action. This  ‘national disgrace’ needs practical action and is urging the Government to issue stronger penalties for those caught and for National Highways to clean up the mess.


He believes National Highways are failing in their duty to keep roads free of rubbish.


He said: “Some of our motorways go through the most beautiful parts of the country. It is like driving through a rubbish tip. We have the technology to prosecute and we’re not doing it.”


Clean it up


Earlier this year, anti-litter campaign group Clean Up Britain launched an action plan calling for the introduction of £1,000 littering fines (up from £150) and for six penalty points on the driver’s licence.


John Read, the group’s Founder, said: “The British public need to see what a disgusting, filthy, rancid country they live in. It’s really sad to say that but it’s true.


“We seem to lost our pride and respect in Britain. We need desperately to get it back because at the moment the country looks like an open cast tip. It really does, it looks like a rubbish bin. We can do so much better than that, but we need to start really understanding it’s a major problem.”