A Labour Council Fined A Resident £1,000 For Putting His Bins Out Early

A Labour council who fined a resident £1,000 for putting his bins out a few hours early has been accused of behaving like the ‘Stasi’.

Clyde Strachan, 37, decided to help refuse collectors by putting his rubbish outside his West Kensington home shortly before midday in May.

He then went away for a week and when he returned he was faced with an ‘environmental enforcement notice’, which demanded he make contact with Hammersmith and Fulham Council.

The engineer then received a £1,000 fixed penalty notice, stating: ‘There was one large box, six bags of waste, and one food bin deposited on the pavement and left.

‘It isn’t collection day so it shouldn’t be there.

‘There is no formal right to appeal, however, the council will accept representations from you within seven days.’

Mr Strachan told The Telegraph: ‘I spoke on the phone to one of the council officers and said I was willing to receive a warning but felt a £1,000 fine was excessive.

‘I said I had put the bins out early as I was not available the next day. It was an honest mistake. I didn’t feel as though I needed to grovel, but it felt like that was what he was after.’

The fine has sparked criticism towards the council’s ‘law enforcement team’.

Comparing it to the ‘Stasi’ – the secret police who helped maintain communist power in East Germany through spying and brutality. 

Robert Jenrick, the shadow justice secretary said: ‘Instead of cracking down on genuine anti-social behaviour, the state tries to reassert itself by punishing well-meaning people for tiny infringements.

‘This huge fine for putting the bins out a few hours early veers into Stasi-like control of people’s lives. This man was clearly doing the right thing in the circumstances.’

Since then, the fine has been withdrawn.

A council spokesman said: ‘Mr Strachan asked for a review of the FPN on May 28 when he let us know that the reason he put the rubbish out early was that he had been going on holiday the following day.

‘The following day, the council froze the fine pending a review.

‘We have since cancelled the FPN as we agree that Mr Strachan made an honest mistake and is not a persistent fly-tipper.’

It makes me laugh. The council can fine you for putting your rubbish out early, but you can’t sue the council when they don’t collect your waste on time or go on strike.

This is incredible and the people in charge of that department at the council should talk with their staff and find out who made this decision and who authorised the fine.

It’s about time we were given the names of these people who work in government departments, ruining the lives of everyday people, and hiding behind their pen-pushing desks, but then I guess they’ve got to pay for those comfy hotels somehow!

This guy was obviously using his initiative, but that’s not allowed these days, much the same as having an opinion that doesn’t fit the narrative.

Councils should be going after the real fly-tippers, but instead, they are just going for the easy targets. Just enter the country illegally, get the red carpet treatment, and put your bin out on the wrong day. The problem is he is he isn’t a migrant and he doesn’t need an interpreter.

Since you can never be sure when they will arrive, many people set their bins out the night before to make sure they don’t miss the collection if the bin lorry is early.

The worrying point of this story is that the notice said, ‘There was no right to appeal.’ There should always be a right to appeal because mistakes get made even by Labour councils.