Non-Hertfordshire residents face county council tip ban

Non-residents could be barred from a county's tips under new proposals.

Hertfordshire County Council said more than one in five users at its sites came from outside the county, and at some it was more than half.

It said the plan could save £433,000 in the 2024-25 financial year, if adopted at a meeting on Monday.

Under the new system visitors would need to bring proof of address when travelling to a tip, or staff would do a postcode check.

"The data suggests 'net' use of Hertfordshire recycling centres by non-residents is in excess of 20 per cent and rising," a report, highlighted by the Local Democracy Reporting Service (LDRS), said.

Estimates have indicated more than 60% of users at Royston and 58% at Bishop's Stortford come from outside the county. The towns lie on the borders of Cambridgeshire and Essex.

In 2021-22, Hertfordshire had 16 recycling centres that handled 80,000 tonnes of waste, on a budget of £5.5m.

The report noted that authorities in Enfield, Harrow, Hillingdon, Buckinghamshire, Central Bedfordshire and Essex all restricted non-residents, but Cambridgeshire and Barnet did not.

But the report accepted there would still be continuing costs.

"Whilst some aspects of the recycling centre service costs would remain, such as staffing and running costs, should a proportion of non-residents be successfully directed to recycling centre provision in their own administrative areas, savings would arise from service aspects such as waste transport and material disposal, in particular, residual waste," it said.

Find BBC News: East of England on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter. If you have a story suggestion email [email protected]