To ask the Minister of Agriculture, Environment and Rural Affairs to detail the support given to, and the conversations had with, local councils and community and voluntary environmental groups regarding litter and pollution clean-ups.

DAERA uses a combined approach of legislation, education & awareness, and enforcement to tackle litter. My Department works closely with Councils & environmental NGOs to develop and support educational & promotional campaigns aimed at achieving behavioural change. The Environment Fund directly supports ‘Keep Northern Ireland Beautiful’ (KNIB) which runs a number of programmes, including: ‘Eco-Schools’; ‘Live Here, Love Here’; ‘Big Spring Clean; & ‘Adopt-A-Spot’ projects.

Over £3m has been awarded to KNIB since 2007/8 with additional current funding of over £1m to further support its campaigns. These make environmental awareness & action an intrinsic part of the life and ethos of our communities, and focus on practical, positive environmental behavioural change.

DAERA supports the ‘Big Spring Clean,’ this is NI's largest community clean-up campaign. To date, 100 Big Spring Clean kits have been provided to individuals organising clean-ups during April & May of this year. Support has also been provided with plans to host beach and neighbourhood cleans with local residents and businesses, within COVID-19 guidelines, in the near future.

My Department also funds and supports the Adopt-A-Spot programme. At present, there are 392 active Adopt-A-Spots across Northern Ireland, with 80 groups on the waiting list for kits due to exceptionally high demand this year. These kits offer practical support to volunteer groups on their clean up journeys, and KNIB is available to provide advice to groups in regards to clean-up events.

Supported by the funding provided by my Department, KNIB regularly liaises with Councils through the ‘Live Here, Love Here’ (LHLH) initiative. This includes regular interaction to organise waste material collections; promoting media campaigns throughout 10 council areas to address litter issues; increasing awareness of littering Fixed Penalty Notices; and celebrating local initiatives, such as through the “Tales Of The Times” virtual celebration event held in March.

An additional media campaign addressing on-the-go, PPE and beauty spot littering was developed and aired last July as the first lockdown restrictions were easing and litter was becoming an obvious issue once again.

This year, through the Tackling Plastics NI project funded by my Department, coastal schools will receive focused education and help in receiving equipment to prevent litter and pollution at our coasts and in our waterways.

DAERA also provides funding to KNIB to produce the annual Marine Litter Report which contains counts of litter items, litter types and geographical breakdown of the litter items. DAERA’s Marine Division produced NI’s first Marine Litter Strategy in 2013, which is delivered through a coalition of partners.

My Department appointed KNIB to gather data from all councils on their use of fixed penalty notices for both litter and dog fouling offences. Each council received correspondence requesting feedback on the effectiveness of the current powers and fines. In addition, several councils submitted additional correspondence on these issues directly to me. My officials are reviewing this data to inform the Department’s review of the current fixed penalty notice regime which will feed into our first Environment Strategy, which is due to be consulted upon later this year.

The Department has also issued a series of communications, delivered by the Waste & Resources Action Programme (WRAP), to support waste management and recycling behaviours and to combat fly-tipping and littering. A flyer was sent to every household in Northern Ireland with details of how to manage waste and recycling during the Covid-19 crisis. There were also radio adverts on local stations and a range of social media posts on various platforms highlighting the problems of fly-tipping, littering and illegal waste dumping.

At the outset of the Covid-19 pandemic, I recognised that continuation of council household waste management services was necessary to safeguard human health and protect the environment. There was, and remains, a need to ensure, that as far as possible, public services continue in a safe and responsible manner. The funding secured from the Executive in this financial year has resulted in a total package to all Councils worth £15.2m to assist with the additional waste costs which have arisen during the pandemic. My Department has worked closely with Council officials, throughout the pandemic, to distribute this allocation across the eleven councils – a significant element of which will assist with tackling additional litter and fly-tipping.

Of course we need to continue extensive collaboration with local councils and other stakeholders on waste management matters to build upon the public’s impressive approach to recycling in recent years. The current £23 million Household Waste Recycling Collaborative Change Programme financially supports local councils to further increase recycling rates and improve the quality of recycling. To date, I have made £4.826m available for nine projects. These will not only boost the quality and economic value of recycling but also encourage responsible waste management practices, helping to reduce incidents of littering and fly-tipping.