Dog fouling fines set to rise to £75

The Council’s neighbourhood enforcement officers are to be given powers to

Fly tipping

• issue an “on the spot fine” for low level fly-tipping with a penalty of £400 (reduced to £240 for early repayment).

Between April 2015 and January 2016, 1298 cases of fly-tipping were reported across York. This was an 11% increase on the previous year. The definition of small scale fly-tipping to be adopted will be anything from a single bag to a small van load. Prosecution will continue to be sought for fly-tipping on a larger scale or of a hazardous nature. The average cost for clearance of fly-tips is in the region of £400 when the tipping charge, labour costs and removal of any hazardous waste is taken into account

Car repairs/sales on public highway

• ·         issue a Fixed Penalty Notice (FPN) for advertising for sale two or more vehicles within 500m of each other or repairing vehicles on the public highway, with a penalty of £100 (reduced to £75 for early repayment).

This will enable the Council to issue an FPN for the offence of carrying out restricted works to a vehicle on the highway (repair, maintenance, servicing, improvement or dismantling of the vehicle or any part of the vehicle, installation, replacement or renewal of parts) unless the repair is within 72 hours of a breakdown or accident. The Council investigated 16 reports of this nature during 2015/16.

Dog micro-chipping

• ·         enforce the Micro-chipping of Dogs (England) Regulations 2015 when related to incidents of anti-social behaviour  & raise the FPN charge for dog fouling to £75

From 6th April 2016 every keeper of a dog must ensure that their dog is micro-chipped. Under the new regulations, details relating to all dogs and their keepers are required to be kept on one of UK’s authorised micro-chipping databases. Details stored on the database include: full name and address of the keeper, if the keeper is also a breeder, original name of dog, contact telephone number of keeper, any new name given to the dog by the current keeper, sex of dog, estimated date of birth of dog, colour, micro-chip number. The Neighbourhood Enforcement Team have access to scanners for detection of dog-chips. A number of animal welfare organisations, such as the RSPCA, PDSA and Dogs Trust provide free or discounted services for low income pet owners, including micro-chipping.

Other “on the spot” fine levels include:

• Graffiti £75
• Flyposting £75
• Breach of Public Space Protection Order £100
• Breach of Community Protection Order £100
• Failure to produce a waste transfer note £300

The proposal will be discussed at a meeting taking place on 20^th June