Litter and illegal dumping
Throwing away a cigarette butt or leaving food scraps in the park is not as innocent as you might think. The government is trying to thoroughly tackle littering and illegal dumping in our society.
In this Wanted Fact, you will read about the difference between littering and illegal dumping. In addition, you will find out what fines you risk for doing so.
Litter
Litter is waste that people leave where it does not belong. Think of cigarette butts or chewing gum that end up on the ground, or food scraps and packaging that people leave behind instead of throwing them away in the available bins. Leaving litter, moreover, is not necessarily a deliberate action. Thus, littering also occurs when someone unknowingly, such as out of forgetfulness, leaves litter outside their home.
Illegal dumping
Unlike litter, illegal dumping is always a deliberate action. Traitors deliberately flee the collection of their household or commercial waste. A case of illegal dumping occurs when waste is left in places or at times when it is not allowed, or in the wrong bins or containers.
How are litter and illegal dumping dealt with?
In many cases, the municipality will include the management of littering or illegal dumping in a police regulation. Violations are then penalized with a GAS fine, which is a municipal administrative sanction. Such violations are no longer considered a criminal offense, and you will not be prosecuted criminally for them.
If the municipality does not choose to include littering in the police regulation, it is the responsibility of the local police or an environmental supervisor to act based on the Environmental Enforcement Decree when there is a violation of the Materials Decree.
Enforcement by GAS fines
As the offences in this case are not punishable under criminal law, no intervention by the public prosecutor or the courts is needed to impose this sanction. This allows the municipality to act quickly and efficiently and decide for itself how to tackle litter and illegal dumping.
Enforcement with the Materials Decree
In cases where a municipality's GAS regulations do not regulate the sanctioning of litter and illegal dumping, enforcement of these violations can be done on the basis of the Materials Decree.
Article 12 of the Materials Decree states the following:
‘It is prohibited to leave or manage waste in violation of
the requirements of this decree or its implementing decrees.’
The Materials Decree stipulates that supervision and administrative enforcement are carried out in accordance with the Environmental Enforcement Decree.
Litter and illegal dumping constitute a violation of Article 12 of the Materials Decree, so enforcement is thus carried out according to the Environmental Enforcement Decree.
According to the Environmental Enforcement Decree, local and regional environmental supervisors, as well as the local police, are responsible for the enforcement of breaches.
In this route of enforcement, the competent environmental supervisor or the police draw up an official report. They then send the official report to the public prosecutor, who then decides whether they will either deal with it criminally or forward it to the enforcement division of the Department of the Environment, which can impose an administrative fine.
An administrative fine
The public prosecutor can forward the file to the Environment Department, which can then proceed to impose an administrative fine.
Because the fine forks in the regulations are broad, the Environment Department has broad decision-making powers. Therefore, when imposing an administrative fine, the Department relies on a decision framework, as a result of which similar offences obtain similar fines. Nevertheless, for exceptional cases, or cases with specific elements, the Department may apply a tailor-made assessment and fine.
1. The severity of the offences
The Department determines the ‘ severity of the offences’ criterion for litter and illegal dumping based on the quantity and nature of the waste, as well as the location of the offences.
The following amounts are examples of ‘severity amounts’ applied by the Department:
In addition, the Department estimates the fine amount for even larger amounts of waste in proportion to the amount of waste left behind.
Moreover, the presence of hazardous waste, such as asbestos or discarded electronic and electrical waste, as well as the location of the event, e.g. in a nature reserve, can increase the fine.
In addition, the Department fines the abandonment of waste in a professional context double the above penalty amounts.
2. The circumstances in which the offender committed the acts
Three types of circumstances can be distinguished.
When the offender proceeds to recovery, the possibility of fining will not be removed, but may result in a reduced fine as a mitigating circumstance.
Specific mitigating circumstances include rehabilitation, when the offender cleans up the waste, or payment of clean-up costs, etc.
- Aggravating circumstances
When the offender opposes, deliberately seeks to mislead or states aggressive behaviour, this may trigger an increase in the fine as an aggravating circumstance.
- Financial strength of the offender
The administrative fine is punitive in nature. It aims to deter the offender from committing the offences again. Therefore, the Department matches the fine to the offender's financial capacity.
Reasonable decision period
The decision period within which the Department must proceed to fine is 180 days for an environmental offence and 90 days for an environmental infringement after the initiation of proceedings. These are ‘deadlines of order’, meaning that exceeding them does not lead to any consequence, and the Department thus retains the power to fine.
Once more than 360 days have elapsed for misdemeanours or 180 days for infringements, the Department may take into account the extent of the delay. This may therefore lead to a reduction of the fine by 10% to 50%.
An administrative transaction?
The Department of the Environment may also resort to the so-called ‘administrative transaction’ in certain cases. In this, the offender receives a proposal for payment that is usually lower than any administrative fine.
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