Appendix 4 –
Information provided by the Director of Communities, Economy and
Transport.
- Digital Exclusion and the Equality Impact
Assessment:
-
- The concern regarding digital exclusion is
noted, but a weekday telephone service is regarded as an
appropriate accessible alternative. The waste team will monitor
this level of service and can review if necessary. The waste team
will also ensure that residents who make telephone bookings will be
able to book up to two weeks in advance to ensure they are able to
visit at weekends. Affected residents may be able to have someone
make an online booking on their behalf if they need to make an
unanticipated visit on the day over the weekend.
- Kent County Council and West Sussex County
Council operate their contact centres Monday to Friday only and do
not accept telephone bookings at the weekend.
- The modelling assumes that 1% of bookings are
made by phone. This assumption was based on West Sussex and Kent
who also receive around 1% of bookings via telephone.
- The point made regarding friends and
relatives helping will be addressed during the design of the
system. The waste team will ensure that the system can accommodate
situations where friends or relatives need to make bookings on
behalf of residents.
- Business Case for Savings:
- The business case for the online booking
system has been carefully considered and is based on savings
associated with a small reduction in waste, net of the estimated
running costs of the system, including the telephone booking
service. The expected savings are £50,000. The waste team
will monitor savings when the system is implemented and can return
with an update to Scrutiny to report on progress.
- In Principle Agreement:
o As part
of the Government's Devolution White Paper, all two-tier
authorities were invited on 5 February 2025 to submit proposals for
local government reorganisation. An interim plan for working up the
proposal for East Sussex is being considered by Full Council and
Cabinet on 20 March. Part of the proposal is to establish
principles about how the Councils will work together and this
includes the principle that ‘Decisions made by all sovereign
bodies until vesting day will have the interests of the future
unitary Council as an explicit consideration’. These
principles will be considered as part of the plan, and a decision
made on how to proceed.
o
Therefore, whilst working principles have been drafted with
District and Borough Councils, these are yet to be considered
through the County Council’s formal decision-making processes
and therefore do not form part of the Council’s policy
framework. Notwithstanding, the Council continues to work with
District and Borough Councils; and the impacts of decisions on
partners, including District and Borough Councils and any potential
unitary authority, are considered as one of a number of factors
within the decision making process.
o In
discussions with the Boroughs and Districts it has also been
recognised that each council remains sovereign and has legal
responsibility to balance its budget until vesting day for a new
unitary. Whilst all councils are committed to strong partnership
working to consider fully impacts on other councils and/or the new
unitary, the principle cannot bind any of the councils.
This is important as the potential new unitary authority is a
future organisation, which as yet, has no worked up agreed proposal
in place, no government decision, and if agreed will not come into
being for a number of years.
o In the
context of the requirement for ESCC to make savings to deliver a
balanced budget for 2025/26, in making decisions on the specific
proposal the Lead Member considered their current statutory
responsibilities.
o Appendix
2 of the Lead Member report outlined the public consultation
responses where concerns were raised about fly-tipping. It
explained that other waste collection authorities in places where
booking has been introduced did not experience an increase in fly
tipping because of introducing booking systems. The Appendix also
highlighted a 2023 report commissioned by the Department for
Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) which concluded that
there is no indication that fly-tipping is linked to the
introduction of booking schemes.
- National Fly-Tipping Concerns:
- The experience of other authorities who have
introduced a booking system (e.g. Kent and West Sussex) and the
2023 DEFRA report, does not suggest that the introduction of an
online booking system will lead to an increase in fly-tipping.
Nationally, fly-tipping has increased but there is no indication
that this is because of the introduction of booking systems.
- The graph below shows total fly tip incidents
in East Sussex over the last 12 years. Fly tipping in East Sussex
has ranged from between 3000 incidents in 2019/20 to 6000 incidents
in 2012/13. Over the last ten years between 3000 and 4000 incidents
a year have been reported across the county.

For the last five
years there have been 6-8 incidents of fly tipping per 1,000 people
across East Sussex. The table below shows how East Sussex compares
with the South East, London and nationally.
2034/24
|
Incidents per 1,000 people
|
East
Sussex
|
8
|
South
East
|
11
|
England
|
20
|
London
|
50
|
- Organised Crime:
- The concerns and link regarding organised
crime involvement in fly tipping, as seen in Kent, are related to
industrial scale fly tipping and are not directly relevant to our
proposal. East Sussex County Council’s primary obligation is
to manage East Sussex residents’ household waste, and to
ensure that East Sussex residents have reasonable levels of access
to Household Waste Recycling Sites (HWRSs).
- The link to the Kent webpage is about
reporting fly tipping, how to manage waste correctly, and the
impact fly-tipping has. We recognise the impact fly-tipping has on
communities, but as mentioned above there is no evidence that
introducing a booking system will lead to an increase in the
fly-tipping of domestic waste.
- West Sussex action on fly
tipping:
- The work in West Sussex is not connected to
their booking system, but is part of their ongoing collaboration
between councils, police, and other agencies to tackle waste
crime.
- In East Sussex the Waste Crime Practitioners
Group has been operational for over 12 years. It consists of
members from various authorities within East Sussex, each having a
role in addressing waste crime. Representatives include, but are
not limited to, Sussex Police, Local Authorities, County Planning
Enforcement, County Traveller Liaison, the County Waste Team,
Trading Standards, and the Environment Agency.
7.
Conclusion
o
The system should not be an obstacle to any resident of East Sussex
who wants to visit one of the sites with their own waste. The waste
team will work to ensure that the HWRS booking system meets the
needs of all residents and considers any concerns raised.