Fly-tipping in Swale council area: incidents, enforcement and fines

Among the 267 councils in England that count all incidents, Swale had the 92nd highest rate of fly-tipping per resident in 2024/25. Of the 57 ranked councils in the South East, it had the 10th highest rate. The count was up 20% on 2023/24 (2,207), against a rise of 9% in Defra's England total.

The region and England columns add up the 57 councils in the South East and the 269 in England that count all incidents. In England, 26 councils that count only some incidents or changed how they count during the year, and 1 with no figure, are left out. The enforcement figures also leave out 4 councils that returned no actions or only part of a year: Isles of Scilly, Cheltenham, Chorley and Liverpool.

Highways accounted for the most incidents in Swale: 1,631, or 61% (England 33%). Compared with England, a larger share was on watercourses and banks (1.5% against 0.2%) and back alleyways (20.2% against 9.0%).

The most common kind of waste was other household waste, in 1,429 incidents (54%; England 44%). Relative to England, Swale had a larger share of asbestos (1.9% against 0.3%), tyres (2.3% against 1.1%) and white goods (9.3% against 4.7%). Hazardous waste: 50 incidents involved asbestos and 22 incidents involved chemical drums, oil and fuel.

36% were a car boot load or less (England 53%). 64% were van loads (England 43%). None was recorded as a tipper lorry load or larger (England 3.7%).

The council took 311 enforcement actions against fly-tipping in 2024/25, 11.7 for every 100 incidents (England 42.1, the South East 32.8). The most common action was investigations (274, 88% of all actions; England 68%). It issued 16 fixed penalty notices (5.1% of its actions; England 8.4%): 12 for fly-tipping itself and 4 to householders who passed waste to an unlicensed carrier (household duty of care).

6 fixed penalty notices were recorded as paid in the year. The council told Defra that its fixed penalty for fly-tipping is £1,000. No prosecutions were recorded. Among the 254 councils ranked on enforcement, Swale had the 55th lowest rate of actions per 100 incidents and the 106th highest share of fixed penalty notices.

The chart shows fly-tipping incidents per 1,000 residents in Swale in each year from 2019/20 to 2024/25, with Defra's England total. The rate was above the England total's in 2 of those 6 years and below it in 4. It starts in 2019/20, the first year for which Defra records how each council counts incidents.

Councils record fly-tipping in different ways and some have changed how they record it, so a rise or fall can reflect recording as well as dumping.

Of the 57 councils in the South East ranked for 2024/25, Southampton had the highest rate (47.1 per 1,000) and Vale of White Horse the lowest (2.9). Brighton and Hove, Crawley, Epsom and Ewell, Fareham, Gravesham, New Forest and Tunbridge Wells are listed but not ranked: ranks cover only councils that count all incidents, with 100 or more in the year.

About these figures: source, Defra, fly-tipping statistics for England, local authority table (published 25 February 2026), gov.uk. Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. An incident is an illegal deposit of waste that a council dealt with or had reported to it, from a single black bag to multiple lorry loads; councils return the figures to Defra through WasteDataFlow each quarter.

Most fly-tipping on private land is cleared by the landowner and is not counted, and the largest and most organised dumping is dealt with by the Environment Agency, which is not included. Since 2019/20 Defra has recorded whether each council counts all incidents or only those reported by the public or found by its own staff. Councils that count only some incidents record fewer, so they, and councils that changed how they count during the year, are not ranked here. Sizes are recorded for the incidents a council investigated and cleared, so they can add up to fewer than all incidents.

Enforcement actions include investigations, warning letters, fixed penalty notices and prosecutions; court fine figures exclude fixed penalty payments. Rates are per resident, so council areas where many people work or visit but few live, such as central London, have high rates for that reason.

Rates use the population in Defra's table (ONS mid-year estimates). Defra's England total includes every council and its estimates for missing returns. On this page the England and region comparisons add up only the councils that count all incidents, and their enforcement figures leave out councils that returned no actions or only part of a year, as the ranks do; the chart's England line is Defra's total.