Milton Keynes City Council’s enforcement officers have recently been visiting small businesses around the city to check they are disposing of commercial waste correctly.
In the last two weeks the team have visited around 120 businesses to ask for their waste contract details and give advice where the owner hadn’t been following the law.
Under the Environmental Protection Act, which has been in place for more than 30 years, UK businesses of any kind must contain their waste safely and dispose of it properly, whether that’s packaging, scrap technology, material produced through a production process or anything else.
Some businesses choose to do this through a commercial contractor, but others organise waste individually, keeping details of how and what was disposed of. Businesses can take trade waste to the Newport Pagnell tip for a fee, but they can’t however simply put trade waste into domestic bins for collection.
The city council’s enforcement team have been carrying out spot checks with businesses, and of the 120 visits, all firms have been asked to produce waste contracts for checking at a later date. In theory, businesses who fail to produce the right documents could be issued an on-the-spot fine of £300, or face prosecution.
"Our enforcement officers are visiting local businesses with a request to produce their waste disposal documents. We want to remind businesses that they need to arrange for their waste to be collected by a registered waste carrier or take it to a licensed point."
Cllr Wilson-Marklew added, “We are cracking down on offenders who fail to produce their documents. Those putting their waste out as regular household rubbish puts a massive pressure on our crews and businesses have a duty of care to dispose of their waste responsibly.”