Fined for putting too much rubbish in his bin
Last updated 15:39, Monday, 21 April 2008
A Whitehaven man has spoken of his shock at being fined for having too much waste in his bin.
Gareth Wilson Corkhill, 26, of the Oval, Mirehouse, was prosecuted by Copeland council.
He was charged with overfilling his bin, which had its lid raised.
He said: “My bin lid was only open four inches. I was in shock when I found out about the fine. I couldn’t believe they would do that.
“I don’t leave the rubbish on the floor. Every fortnight you can guarantee people’s bins will be open more than mine.
“I have my rubbish collected every fortnight. There are five people in my family, three children, me and my wife. Plus I have my daughter over on weekends.
“We recycle everything we can, including plastics, cardboard, tins, glass and paper. We have got a black box that is always full.
“It’s only an £80 fine for flytipping. I would have been better off doing that.”
A council enforcement officer took photos of the bin in January and issued an on the spot fine shortly afterwards.
He added: “They took pictures of the bin. Next time the came around they issued an on the spot fine.
“I was told I would go to prison if I didn’t pay.”
Mr Corkhill was offered the chance to pay a fixed penalty of £110 rather than be brought to court.
When he did not pay up he was fined £110, plus £100 prosecution costs and £15 surcharge.
A spokesman for Copeland council said: “Copeland Borough Council will continue to crack down on the problem of overflowing bins, which cause problems for local residents and in the battle to reduce waste. It is important that we all reduce the amount of waste we send to landfill.
“We can do this by recycling more of what is in our bins, and we would advise anyone who has a problem with too much waste to look at what can be recycled. Much of your waste can be recycled either via the kerbside recycling scheme, or via your nearest recycling collection site.
“Further information is available from Copeland Council, or via the website, www.copeland.gov.uk or www.recycleforcumbria.org.”
Should people be fined for putting out too much rubbish? Tell us below
If the gentleman had paid his original fine then he wouldn't have had all this publicity and he wouldn't have a criminal record.
The offence was NOT paying the fine, and NOT the fact he had overfilled.
I live in a family of four and in over 10 year of using wheelie bin and with fortnightly collections have never ever had a need to overfill it
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CPip did you have children in nappies because my daughter lived on the same estate and she had a family of four too she had big problems with fortnightly wheelie bin collections and had two infants in nappies.We had to take her rubbish off her so she wouldn't get fined! This is supposed to be a service surely we should not have to do this!!!!!!
Posted by susan on 6 May 2008 kl. 14:43