An 'alarming' surge in fly-tipping has been recorded in one of West Lothian's most affluent areas.
Southern Livingston saw a spike on fly-tipping reports in the last three months of the year.
The ward, which includes Murieston on the fringes of the Pentlands on the southern boundary of the new town as well as parts of the town centre, saw the costs of clear up rise from just over £6,000 for the last three months of 2021 to almost £12,000 for the same period last year.
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Local councillor, Maria MacAulay described the rise as “very alarming.”
A Cleaner Communities officer with Operational Services, David Lees delivered the figures to a recent meeting of the Livingston South Local Area Committee.
Mr Lees said the 115 reports of fly-tipping in the ward between October and the end of December last year represented just over 25% of all the reported fly-tipping incidents across West Lothian.
The total tonnage of fly-tipping reported and cleared for the three month period last year was 71.44. The cost of clean up in southern Livingston was £11,951 out of a total for the county of £47,076.
That compares with the same quarter for 2021 of 63 tonnes country wide. The clean up costs for the ward was £6,216 out of a county wide total of £41,256.
Councillor MacAulay, for the SNP, told the meeting: “It’s very alarming to see the increase. Just looking at the figures. Is this because you are out and about seeing it , or are people reporting it. How are the figures increasing, especially out of the ward?
Mrs Lees said: “It's a hard one to pinpoint the reasons. The number of enquiries, it is probably more coming from the public. Whether that’s to do with that we have tried to raise awareness over the last year throughout West Lothian.
"Obviously there's a lot of awareness been raised throughout the country because of television programmes. Everyone is more aware. ”
He added: “It looks as though we had quite an increase in the Ladywell area but, again, we cannot pinpoint to a specific area in Ladywell. I'm hoping it’s a blip and will calm down again. It's something we’ll keep an eye on. We do seem to be getting a lot more reports within the ward. If they stay high we’ll investigate to see if there’s a particular reason.”
Councillor MacAulay asked what councillors could do to: “reinforce messages about getting it reported, or rather, not fly-tipping.”.
Mr Lees said that teams were working with the council’s communications team to create a new campaign linked in with national anti-litter groups planning campaigns.
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