Littering laws in force from tomorrow

The new dumping and littering regulations introducing fines ranging between Lm25 and Lm50 for littering and Lm1,000 and Lm2,500 for dumping come into effect tomorrow.

Until the end of the year, offenders will only be warned but if they are caught dumping or littering again after January they would have to pay the fines for the two infringements.

Addressing mayors yesterday, Environment Minister George Pullicino said the new regulations had been welcomed by more than 60 councils and the public, who hoped the regulations would really be enforced.

This, Mr Pullicino said, was the government's intention. Local councils were awaiting the introduction of the regulations and several had organised meetings to explain them to residents.

Malta, he said, could no longer tolerate a situation where money was spent to clean up public places only to be dirtied by a small number of irresponsible people who did not care about the community. So the fines for those who did not want to cooperate had been substantially increased.

For the first time, there would be plain clothes wardens, besides those in uniform to enforce these rules.

The fines, Mr Pullicino said, were not a new tax and none of the money collected would go to the consolidated fund.

A percentage will be shared between local councils and the Malta Environment and Planning Authority with the rest going into an environment fund. This fund will finance small projects in the councils implementing the polluter pays principle.

For the trial period, the scheme will be wholly financed by the government. The expense is expected to reach Lm150,000 and the money will eventually be recovered from the environment fund.

The minister spoke about bring-in sites saying these had to increase from the current 70 to 400, resulting a in site for every 300 families.

In less than a year, the material dumped at these sites had doubled and due to their success there were not enough of them.

WasteServ, he said, had asked councils to indicate where the bins should be placed and it was giving them until the end of March to do so. Otherwise, the government would choose the locations itself.

There were going to be three types of bring-in sites - at schools, in public areas and underground.

The government, Mr Pullicino said, was determined to increase the separation of waste at source.