New freedom of information data shows the scale of the problem with fines for litter. Can we fix it, asks Mark Smith

Believe me when I say I have done my bit for the great Scottish ticket mountain. Driving into the LEZ in Glasgow (it was a genuine mistake, officer): £60. Doing 47 in a 40 (I didn’t see the sign, officer): £100. Pulling away in my car without wearing my seatbelt (I was just about to put it on, officer): £100. But there’s one ticket I know I will never get, partly because it’s an offence I know I’ll never commit and partly because the system for enforcing the tickets is a shambolic, scandalous mess.

But let me explain first what I mean by ‘mountain’. Last year – 2024-25 – drivers in Glasgow were hit with £8,967,919 in parking fines, 83% up on 2022-23, when the fines were £4,899,795. The rise was partly because the fines were increased by £40, but more parts of the city, including Battlefield and Shawlands, are also being lined up to become paid parking zones, so expect the income from fines to go up even more; £750,000 was raised as well in the second year of the LEZ, including a humble £60 from me. The council says all the fines are about controlling parking and pollution and not, repeat not, about the money, but I do not, repeat do not, believe them.

It’s a pity as well that the same regime of fines isn’t being applied to litter. New freedom of information data from the campaign group Clean Up Britain shows that last year in Glasgow, more than 32,000 fly-tipping incidents were identified but only 156 fines were issued, with just 30 paid and zero prosecutions. And the picture is just as bad in Edinburgh: the city issued 346,206 parking tickets last year but the number of littering fines was a total of 1. To be fair, the lack of enforcement appears to be UK-wide: 71 councils failed to issue a single littering fine last year. The founder of Clean........

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