- Asked by: Tim Eagle, MSP for Highlands and Islands, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Friday, 13 June 2025
Submitting member has a registered interest.
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Current Status:
Answered by Gillian Martin on 24 June 2025
To ask the Scottish Government what assessment it has made of any financial impact of fly-tipping on (a) rural landowners and (b) farmers, and what measures it is taking to support the removal of dumped waste on private land.
Answer
The Scottish Government has assessed the wider costs of fly-tipping in Scotland through the Litter and Flytipping: Scale and Cost report, published in 2023. This estimated that the overall direct cost of litter and flytipping in Scotland was £81.2m. Direct costs to public and private bodies, excluding local councils, was estimated to be £20.5m. The research also contains the cost broken down by a number of sectors, including nature-based attractions (including farmland), food and retail/commercial. Insufficient information was received to assess the costs of flytipping for these sectors.
We recognise the financial pressure on private landowners. In 2023-24, the Private Landowners Grant Fund provided targeted support to prevent fly-tipping, including measures such as fencing, signage and surveillance. This extended into 2024-25 to also cover clean-up activities. We continue to explore other ways to support landowners, including involvement in multi-agency enforcement partnerships and clarification of responsibilities under Section 59 of the Environmental Protection Act 1990, as amended by the Circular Economy (Scotland) Act 2024.
- Asked by: Jamie Greene, MSP for West Scotland, Scottish Liberal Democrats
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Date lodged: Friday, 13 June 2025
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Current Status:
Answered by Ivan McKee on 24 June 2025
To ask the Scottish Government how much it has spent through public procurement in each of the last five years, broken down by (a) supplier location and (b) how much went to (i) small to medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and (ii) larger enterprises.
Answer
Using the data published from the ‘Annual Report on Procurement Activity in Scotland’ the following table provides spend from the last available five years, broken down by supplier location and size. These figures are derived from the Scottish Procurement Information Hub - Scottish Government’s spend analytics shared service.
Public Procurement Spend : Supplier Location and Supplier Size Spend
Financial year | Total Spend | Spend within Scotland | Spend not registered within Scotland | Total SME spend | Total Large spend |
2022-2023 | £16.6 billion | £8.9 billion | £7.7 billion | £7.1 billion | £7.9 billion |
2021-2022 | £16 billion | £8.9 billion | £7.1 billion | £6.4 billion | £8.1 billion |
2020-2021 | £14.5 billion | £8.3 billion | £6.2 billion | £5.5 billion | £7.2 billion |
2019-2020 | £13.3 billion | £7.4 billion | £5.9 billion | £5.4 billion | £6.3 billion |
2018-2019 | £12.6 billion | £6.9 billion | £5.7 billion | £5.2 billion | £5.9 billion |
Supplier location is based on the registered invoice postcode of the supplier. Supplier size is based only on number of employees where known. SMEs are defined as those with fewer than 250 employees. Due to incomplete or unavailable supplier invoice data; employee size cannot be accurately determined for some spend resulting in the SME and Large Spend totals being less than the total spend figure.
- Asked by: Tim Eagle, MSP for Highlands and Islands, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Friday, 13 June 2025
Submitting member has a registered interest.
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Current Status:
Answered by Gillian Martin on 24 June 2025
To ask the Scottish Government what engagement it has had with the construction, agricultural and retail sectors to prevent commercial fly-tipping, and what outcomes have resulted from any such discussions.
Answer
The Scottish Government recognises the need to continue to address flytipping from commercial sources and has been consistently working with delivery partners under the National Litter and Flytipping Strategy to do so. For example, through SEPA's partnership enforcement activity and digital disruption online actions. Ongoing measures by SEPA to further strengthen how they regulate waste activities will also have an impact.
These activities, alongside cross-agency engagement including through the Serious Organised Crime Taskforce (SOCT) Environmental Waste Crime Working Group and Scottish Partnership Against Rural Crime (SPARC), are helping to build collective understanding and partnership working across the sector.
- Asked by: Tim Eagle, MSP for Highlands and Islands, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Friday, 13 June 2025
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Current Status:
Answered by Gillian Martin on 24 June 2025
To ask the Scottish Government what measurable reductions in (a) littering and (b) fly-tipping have been recorded since the implementation of the National Litter and Flytipping Strategy 2023-24 Action Plan, and whether it will provide a breakdown by local authority area of (i) any such data and (ii) the number of incidents reported within this timeframe.
Answer
The National Litter and Flytipping Strategy is a six year plan. According to Keep Scotland Beautiful’s Local Environmental Auditing Monitoring System (LEAMS) data, 92.7% of audited street sites met acceptable litter standards in the most recent survey, a 1.7 percentage point increase from the previous year. LEAMS data by local authority area is available on KSB’s website.
As noted in the response to S6W-38714 on 24 June 2025, flytipping data is held at local authority level.
All answers to written Parliamentary Questions are available on the Parliament’s website, the search facility for which can be found at https://www.parliament.scot/chamber-and-committees/written-questions-and-answers
- Asked by: Tim Eagle, MSP for Highlands and Islands, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Friday, 13 June 2025
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Current Status:
Answered by Gillian Martin on 24 June 2025
To ask the Scottish Government how many reports of fly-tipping have been made via (a) the Dumb Dumpers platform and (b) other public reporting channels since 2020, and what proportion of these resulted in enforcement action.
Answer
The Scottish Government does not hold consolidated national data on the number of flytipping reports or enforcement outcomes. Between 2020 and its closure in March 2023, fewer than 900 reports were received annually via the Dumb Dumpers platform. In comparison, the National Litter and Flytipping Strategy’s Flytipping Baseline Report, published in October 2024, sets out that in 2022–23 between 63,378 and 64,486 flytipping incidents were reported directly to local authority systems, depending on the data source.
Data on the proportion of incidents resulting in enforcement action is not held centrally, as this is a matter for local authorities and other enforcement bodies. Improving national consistency in reporting and enforcement data remains a priority under the National Litter and Flytipping Strategy and the Circular Economy (Scotland) Act 2024.
- Asked by: Tim Eagle, MSP for Highlands and Islands, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Friday, 13 June 2025
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Current Status:
Answered by Gillian Martin on 24 June 2025
To ask the Scottish Government what progress has been made on developing a new national online reporting system for littering and fly-tipping, and when this will be operational.
Answer
The National Litter and Flytipping Strategy identifies the need for a new national online reporting system and this remains an ambition. Initial work has been undertaken to consider requirements for future reporting improvements, taking into account learning from previous approaches and the recommendations of the National Litter and Flytipping Strategy Baseline Report, which considered available flytipping data and changes that may be needed in the future.
Work is ongoing through the National Litter and Flytipping Strategy Data Management Group, which includes SEPA and local authorities, to explore options for improving data collection and sharing.
- Asked by: Tim Eagle, MSP for Highlands and Islands, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Friday, 13 June 2025
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Current Status:
Answered by Gillian Martin on 24 June 2025
To ask the Scottish Government how many fixed penalty notices for (a) littering and (b) fly-tipping have been issued in each year since 2019, and what percentage of these were paid in full.
Answer
The Scottish Government does not hold centralised annual data on the number of fixed penalty notices issued for littering and flytipping, or on payment rates. Responsibility for issuing and managing fixed penalties rests with local authorities and other designated bodies, such as Loch Lomond and the Trossachs National Park Authority.
However, the National Litter & Flytipping Strategy’s Flytipping Baseline Report, published in October 2024, includes data submitted by some local authorities on the number of fixed penalty notices issued in recent years. This forms part of wider efforts under the National Litter and Flytipping Strategy to build a more consistent and accessible national picture.
- Asked by: Tim Eagle, MSP for Highlands and Islands, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Friday, 13 June 2025
Submitting member has a registered interest.
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Current Status:
Answered by Gillian Martin on 24 June 2025
To ask the Scottish Government what engagement it had with rural and agricultural stakeholders in the (a) development and (b) delivery of the National Litter and Flytipping Strategy 2023-24 Action Plan, and whether it maintains any ongoing engagement with any such stakeholders.
Answer
The Scottish Government engaged with rural and agricultural stakeholders during both the development of the National Litter and Flytipping Strategy and the 2023-24 Action Plan. During the 2022 public consultation on the draft Strategy, responses were received from organisations including NFU Scotland and Scottish Land & Estates, highlighting the specific challenges faced by landowners and farmers in addressing flytipping.
The Scottish Government and the Strategy delivery partners (SEPA, ZWS and KSB) continue to engage with relevant stakeholders and networks, including Scottish Land & Estates and the Scottish Partnership Against Rural Crime, who are represented on the Strategy’s Delivery Group.
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Current Status:
Withdrawn
- Asked by: Sharon Dowey, MSP for South Scotland, Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party
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Date lodged: Monday, 23 June 2025
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Current Status:
Taken in the Chamber on 24 June 2025
To ask the Scottish Government what its response is to reports that there were almost 30,000 breaches of community payback orders in the last 11 years.
Answer
Taken in the Chamber on 24 June 2025
