Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!
Warning - Giving Away Furniture
Hi everyone
Just wanted to offer a word of warning, after a recent (expensive) mistake...
We had a small bedside table that was in perfect condition and was no longer needed. I did what I've always done with small household items and furniture having lived in London for 15 years - placed it just outside my gate with a sign attached saying "free to a good home." A few weeks later, a penalty notice arrived for £400 for fly-tipping, and the threat of a £20,000 fine if I didn't pay on time.
I emailed the enforcement team, explaining this was a genuine mistake on my part and not an attempt to dispose of furniture illegally (would have been a terrible plan if so, given I was so easily traceable with the item being directly outside my property.) It was a very small piece of furniture that wasn't blocking the public pathway. And, more importantly, I'm not a fly-tipper - I recently had our kitchen renovated and paid hundreds to have the waste disposed of properly, and regularly hire cars to take bulky furniture or waste to the N22 recycling centre. The response was that the fine was issued correctly and I owed the council £400. Pretty annoying when genuine fly-tipping is a chronic issue on the ladder... case and point the soiled mattress at the end of my road two weeks ago, and the dismantled bed in the passage last week, but there we go... my wallet is now £400 lighter for the mistake. I suspect the owners of the mattress and bed aren't worse off but who knows...
But this is really just to say if you have furniture in good knick you want to give away, keep it inside your front garden gate. I've seen people nearby doing the same thing as me - not with rubbish but with clearly nice bits and bobs they want to offer up passers by - and would hate for anyone else to end up in my position!
Mx
Tags for Forum Posts: council, fine, flytipping
Replies to This Discussion
-
Permalink Reply by JamesN on
-
How did the council know it came from your address? CCTV?
I'm not sure how you go about challenging these kinds of fines but it does seem to be obscenely disproportionate. One for your local Councillor or Cllr Seema Chandwani.
-
Permalink Reply by Marv on
-
Very sorry to hear this sparkle!
Hope you have better luck than me with your letter but yes, my experience wasn't encouraging... I spent an hour writing an apology/explanation and the enforcement officer said she recognised my mistake, but as it had been "correctly enforced" I'd still be charged the full £400 fine. As a compromise, she did say I could pay it in instalments, but when I went to the (crap) council website, one of their usual IT glitches meant I could only pay it as one big hefty fine.
Especially annoying when there is such a lot of genuine anti-social behaviour at the moment...
-
-
No idea but would love to know as the bedside table was outside our gate, but we're the first floor flat and the letter was addressed to me. Can only hope they are applying that level of detective work to actual fly-tippers.
-
-
The wall donation system is beneficial to everyone and a credit to our neighbourhood. Handing out fines for this when active fly-tippers are about is ridiculous.
Poorly played Haringey.
-
Permalink Reply by Hugh on
-
I understand why Haringey might want to control this, but I wholeheartedly condemn their method in your case.
I guess the lesson people will take from this is not to put a note on their item, or if they do, claim no knowledge of it if fined. Unless they have a witness to the 'dump' or have evidence to link it to a householder, it would be hard to enforce. Alternatively, or perhaps preferably, use Harringay Online or take your item to the charity shop.
-
-
I presume that the council has served a fixed penalty notice for breach of section 33 of the Environmental Protection Act 1990. This makes it an offence to deposit waste on land without a permit. The council need to be able to prove each element of the offence to be able to serve the notice. The definition of ‘waste’ is key here. Did you intend to discard the item ie it was waste or were you leaving it there with good intentions of the item being reused as furniture by a neighbour. What would you have done if no one had taken it. Presumably you would have brought it back into your property. Local authorities are not very good at following the legal requirements of enforcement. They have a difficult time with not much money. But I suspect there are actual cases of fly tipping they could be focusing on but you were an easy target. Not sure the council will listen to you but worth a try explaining your intentions were not to discard and as a result no offence was committed.
-
-
Thanks for taking the time to respond with this advice Anne-Lise. I think it was section 33. When I wrote my email appealing it to the enforcement officer, I did make it very clear that the item was in good condition, I had put a sign on it making my intentions clear and that if it hadn’t been taken I would of course have just brought it back inside. But they didn’t care… I guess if they can make £400 off me, and I’m not willing to withstand the stress of not paying and then being harassed with more letters etc. why wouldn’t they charge me? Rather than trust it was an honest mistake and I won’t do it again. So I caved and paid it. But £400 for an honest mistake does sting…badly!
-
Permalink Reply by Brian on
-
This is not the first time that this has happened. See: -
https://www.mylondon.news/news/north-london-news/north-london-commu...
I feel the Council is at fault here. Since they knew who you were from the note left on the item they could have either informally or formally advised you that they believed this was an example of fly-tipping and asked you to remove the item. Not doing so meant that the Council would be better off to the tune of £400 and so, cynically, they opted for this route.
A couple of years ago an individual was fined by Haringey Council for putting out her rubbish bag for collection 35 mins ahead oof the 'authorised' time. I liaised with the person concerned. She took the case to the local government Ombudsman who found in her favour: -"The ombudsman pointed to government guidance on FPNs published in 2018 which states that councils cannot issue fixed penalties for “minor problems” such as forgetting to close bin lids or leaving bins out for a few hours before a collection.
While noting that Haringey’s policy was not against the law, the ombudsman noted in their decision that councils should “act proportionately, appropriately and fairly”."
The Ombudsman required the Council to reimburse ALL residents who had received fines for the same 'offence',
"Having now amended the policy, Haringey council is to refund or cancel 191 fines totalling £42,920."
The Council was obliged to offer the individual in this case £100 by way of compensation and the practice of fining individuals on the basis outlined was suspended.
https://www.letsrecycle.com/news/haringey-must-refund-42000-in-flaw...
My recommendation is that you take your case also to the Local Govt Ombudsman (it is a free service) and advise your local councillors that you plan to do so. They may wish to intervene on your behalf and attempt to have a modicum of common sense applied to this case - and your fine refunded. Please quote the government guidance on FPNs above. This is clearly a case of a sledgehammer to crack a nut
I would argue that the Council had the option to contact you informally to remove the item but chose not to because they stood to benefit to the tune of £400 as a result.
I wonder what fine should be for councillors who have run up an debt in the borough of an estimated £1.7billion.
Please keep us updated on any developments. (I should like to post your original post above on a number of local Facebook pages as a warning to other residents. Please let me know if you are agreeable to my doing so.) Good luck!
-
-
Thank you Brian for such a helpful response! Will certainly look into the ombudsman and please feel free to share my message. As I said, very keen others are made aware so they don’t make the same mistake.
If I have any updates, will let you know.
-
-
I fully understand the stress of the situation. Enforcement authorities sometimes pick the ‘easy target’ honest responsible people rather than difficult people who are actually doing harm. If you have the strength I would still complain as widely as you can. Writing to your MP can sometimes be successful?
© 2024 Created by Hugh.
Powered by
