A multi-million pound tax bill is preventing the Environment Agency from clearing thousands of illegal waste dumps across England, leaving communities exposed to environmental hazards and foul odours.
The Tax Barrier Blocking Cleanups
In a policy branded as "extremely unhelpful" and "ludicrous", the Environment Agency (EA) must pay millions in landfill tax to the Treasury if it clears illegally dumped waste. This financial burden is seen as a key reason the agency has failed to act on even the most severe sites.
Of the £15 million of taxpayer money funding the clearance of Hoad's Wood in Kent – the only site the EA has committed to cleaning – a staggering £4 million is purely landfill tax. Liberal Democrat peer John Russell, who pushed for the Kent cleanup, urged the Treasury to take an "urgent, fresh, cold hard look" at the rules.
"It is extremely unhelpful … to make the EA pay landfill tax on the illegal waste sites they are trying to clear up," Russell said, highlighting a lack of joined-up government that lets criminals profit while ordinary people suffer.
Bickershaw's 25,000-Tonne Nightmare
Nowhere is the impact more acute than in Bickershaw, Wigan, where 25,000 tonnes of waste has been dumped near homes and a primary school on Bolton House Road. Despite months of pleas from local MP Josh Simons, the EA refuses to clear the mountain of rubbish, citing the complex legal and financial landscape.
The cleanup cost is estimated at £4.5 million, again including a hefty landfill tax portion. The site, partly on a field where children played sports, is an environmental hazard causing rat infestations, air pollution, and a persistent stench.
"My kids have to go to school every day with that stench and air pollution and they cannot play outside on the field any more," said one anonymous parent. "But there is no urgency to clean this up."
Another resident described feeling abandoned, especially after media attention focused on a similar dump in Kidlington, Oxfordshire. "Thousands of tonnes of illegally dumped waste have been left to rot here," she said, reporting infestations in attics and walls.
The crisis escalated in July when the dump caught fire, with the blaze raging for nine days. The primary school was forced to close, and residents had to seal their homes against toxic fumes during a heatwave.
Organised Crime and a 'Broken System'
Organised crime groups are capitalising on this systemic failure. Waste crime costs the UK taxpayer an estimated £1 billion a year. Criminals exploit the landfill tax, set at £126 per tonne, by pocketing the tax and dumping lorryloads at illegal sites, making around £2,500 per articulated lorry.
Simons, the Labour MP for Makerfield, said he alerted the EA in January when rubbish first arrived at a rate of 20 truckloads a day, but no intervention came. "The impact of this blatant criminality continues to be very severe on the community," he stated.
John Russell argues for full transparency from the EA on the scale of the problem. "We cannot effectively fight that which we do not know," he said, calling for details on locations, sizes, and types of waste. "We have got a broken system and stuff is swept under the carpet and there is no accountability."
An EA spokesperson said a criminal investigation is ongoing in Wigan, treating the dumping as a critical incident. They stated they are "using all the powers and the enforcement tools available" to bring perpetrators to justice and make them pay.
Wigan Council, part of a multi-agency partnership with the EA and police, said it understands the community's distress and wants the site cleared "as a matter of urgency," but acknowledged the legal and financial complexities are significant.
