Towards a litter-free Scotland: a strategic approach to higher quality local environments

The goal is to communicate effectively and accessibly about litter, with consistent messages that engage the public and motivate behaviour change.

We ask delivery partners to enhance their communications activities and to make it clear why people should take personal responsibility for their waste.

We will:

• Run a national behaviour-change marketing campaign during 2014 and build on the delivery partners' communication toolkit.
• Develop innovative and creative approaches to communication, such as using art, to highlight the effect of litter and flytipping on people and wildlife.
• Continue to promote re-use and repair through Revolve - the reuse organisations' quality standard.
• Continue to expand and promote the Recycle for Scotland initiative.
• Review the Dumb Dumpers website and public reporting mechanism to support people who wish to take action against flytipping.

Children and young people should have the opportunity to understand the importance of environmental quality, and the benefits of resource efficiency.

We will work with council education services and organisations such as Education Scotland and Young Scot to develop initiatives and resources that encourage young people to do the right thing with waste. We encourage delivery partners to contribute to the development of materials and to include these within their existing education projects.

The approach will explore how to build on or complement existing environmental and sustainability education initiatives, including EcoSchools and Learning for Sustainability.

Empowered local communities can take greater ownership of the quality of their local environments.

Communities can take preventative action such as building fences to restrict access to flytipping sites, or work with local businesses to educate their customers.

Community action includes local clean ups. High-profile examples of these are Keep Scotland Beautiful's Clean Up Scotland initiative and the Marine Conservation Society's Beachwatch programme. There are also highly-successful local initiatives which play a significant role in raising awareness and improving the quality of local environments.

We will discuss opportunities with delivery partners, particularly those in the third sector. We expect this will include:

• Support for local communities to clean up and prevent litter/flytipping problems on land which others are not already taking responsibility for. We will pilot an incentivised community clean up scheme to tackle litter black spots.
• Enabling participation in prevention and community clean up activity through dialogue with equality groups.

• Pilot action to address issues particular to rural communities, such as litter on remote beaches or abandoned vehicles.

We will encourage delivery partners to seek the input of the third sector and local communities when developing their delivery plans.

Litter can be turned into a resource for Scotland.

We want to make it easy for people to recycle in public places. We will work with our delivery partners to increase Recycle on the Go facilities and explore how to boost the quantity, quality and range of material recycled.

This will include:

• Support for innovation: working with organisations to explore how to recycle more items such as chewing gum.
• Update the Sustainable Events Guide to help event organisers to plan how they will help people to recycle. For example, providing mobile facilities.

Packaging plays an important role in protecting products. We believe some product and packaging design can be developed in ways that reduce litter and help people to take personal responsibility for their waste.

We will:

• Provide a focus for business interests to redesign products and packaging to reduce littering or reduce its impact.
• Encourage customer loyalty schemes that reward people for resource efficiency, such as reusable coffee cups.
• Encourage packaging from sustainable sources which can be reused or recycled.

We will work with delivery partners including the:

• Product Sustainability Forum. ^[11]
• Courtauld ^[12] signatories within the Food and Drink sector.
• Packaging Recycling Group Scotland. ^[13]

Business procedures, staff training and customer engagement can encourage personal responsibility for disposal of waste.

We will work with businesses, local authorities and others to:

• Encourage services and processes that minimise waste, such as the collection of old products for reuse, repair and/or recycling.
• Improve staff training and communications and make it easier for people to report litter and flytipping problems.
• Encourage more reuse and repair, and business models which could help reduce the flytipping of domestic products, such as leasing products and services.
• Encourage businesses to collaborate when commissioning waste collection services in order to ensure their bins are not contributing to litter problems.

We will support businesses through the communications toolkit. Businesses which are committed to sustainable growth, including efforts to tackle litter and flytipping, can receive recognition for their efforts through a nationwide scheme: the Resource Efficiency Pledge.

The Scottish Government provides formal guidance to organisations on what their roles and responsibilities are in relation to litter and flytipping.

We will review the Code of Practice on Litter and Refuse (Scotland) 2006 ( COPLAR) and work with delivery partners to develop effective approaches to delivery that reflect the priorities in this strategy and:

• Clarify organisations' responsibilities.
• Are consistent with Recycle on the Go guidance and the duty of care requirements around the Waste (Scotland) Regulations 2012.
• Support more effective cleanliness standards ^[14] , including tackling litter in trees, bushes and watercourses, and on public, private, urban and rural land.
• Support a proactive approach to identifying litter problems such as preventing accidental and wind-blown litter during recycling collections.
• Identify scenarios for particular action such as special events or extreme weather.
• Highlight how to make smarter use of existing powers - including planning and licensing.
• Support joint working and shared resources such as supporting collaboration with local communities, local authorities, businesses and land managers.
• Support decisions about litter/Recycle on the Go bin design, location and servicing.
• Showcase best practice in litter prevention and management (including the development of delivery or action plans).

We will:

• Work with stakeholders to develop the review, possibly including interim guidance.
• Convene a working group to consider what the guidance should include in relation to littering by young people under 16.
• Pilot interventions that support delivery including action to address accidental/wind-blown litter.
• Consider how to support training so that staff understand their roles in relation to the guidance.

We will provide funding and/or advice for projects which aim to reduce litter and flytipping through information, infrastructure and enforcement interventions.

We will:

• Fund pilot projects to trial and evaluate interventions with potential for wider application.
• Explore how effective procurement (for example of infrastructure or services) can reduce costs for delivery partners.
• Signpost organisations to other funding sources.

It will be a condition of Zero Waste Scotland's litter, flytipping and Recycle on the Go funding that the recipient land managers/businesses commit to including litter and flytipping in delivery plans.

Effective information gathering and analysis means that everyone can understand which measures work most effectively, and will help to prioritise and develop targeted interventions accordingly.

We will continue to develop an evidence-based approach based on problem materials. This will include: where issues occur, why, and how these might be prevented. We will also develop an approach to quantifying the scale of problems, and the impacts of actions to tackle them.

We will work with delivery partners to develop this further. This will:

• Define the outcomes more precisely and the best way to track them - taking account of quality: what matters most to the public, the impact on behaviour, the environment and the quantity of litter and flytipped material.
• Establish baselines and key performance indicators for the strategy and for specific interventions and pilots.

We will take into account the evidence and monitoring systems that already exist.

We will review the strategy in 2016/17 and 2020.

There are already strong enforcement disincentives for flytippers, including the recent increase in fixed penalties and new SEPA enforcement sanctions. Most of the actions in this strategy will have an impact on flytipping as well as litter.

Furthermore, the current 'FlyMapper' ^[15] pilot project aims to improve understanding of the nature, scale and geographical distribution of flytipping incidents on public and private land.

Flytipping is understood to be a deliberate act which may be motivated by the desire to avoid waste disposal or recycling costs. Action to improve our understanding of the factors which contribute to flytipping behaviour will allow us to bring forward further, better-informed, interventions in the future.

We want to build on our recent actions (see 'Actions already underway' at section 3) to boost the effectiveness of enforcement as a deterrent.

We will look for a suitable opportunity to legislate to remove barriers to enforcement in littering from vehicles.

Consultation on the strategy showed general support for further legislation, which we will discuss with key agencies including Police Scotland, Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service and local authorities:

• Waste carriers licensing and duty of care requirements.
• Making it easier for the police to issue fixed penalties.
• Making best use of Litter Control Areas and Street Litter Control Notices. ^[16]
• A mechanism for litter practitioners to intervene when printed material, such as flyers, creates litter problems.

• Adjusting fixed penalty provisions to incentivise prompt payment.

We will continue to encourage organisations with enforcement powers to use them. We will also discuss with other public bodies whether they would benefit from having the power to issue fixed penalties for litter and flytipping.

Supporting enforcement staff to become confident and proficient in their understanding of legislation and application of correct procedures will lead to more effective delivery that:

• Boosts the quality of fixed penalties issued and their payment rate.
• Provides the Crown Office and Procurator Fiscal Service with the information it needs to consider further action when penalties are unpaid.

We will develop an employers' guide to the content and standards they should specify when commissioning training. It will include:

• What processes and materials can help (including smart technology).
• How and when to target enforcement on black spots.
• How best to communicate enforcement action.

We will work with local authorities and other statutory bodies to review current approaches, and develop collaborative projects that help us better understand the impact of enforcement practices - including their deterrent effect. This will help inform effective models and guidance which will support delivery.