Agenda and minutes

Apologies for absence were received from Councillors Ghafoor and Hindle.

There were no public questions for this meeting of the Scrutiny Board to consider.

A report providing an end of year report and details the outcomes and achievements over the last twelve months regarding the Don’t Trash Oldham initiative.

The Scrutiny Board received a report of the Director of Environment reviewing progress of the ‘Don’t Trash Oldham’ initiative. Clean streets and tackling issues of fly tipping and littering that blight the Borough’s communities remained a priority for Oldham residents and for the Council. The second iteration of the Don’t Trash Oldham (DTO) campaign had commenced in October 2022, and was in addition to community engagement, it also focused on betterment/transforming communities by working with ward members, which was supported by a limited budget for each area, which could be used to realise the requests of Councillors.

The Director’s report therefore provided an end of year report and detailed the outcomes and achievements over the last twelve months; it examined the lessons learned (what has worked and what could be improved) and proposed some new measures/targeted interventions for the future which aimed to strike a balance between new ways of working whilst addressing the ongoing environmental challenges faced by the residents of Oldham and the Council’s approach in tackling such challenges.

The Director of Environment reported that from October 2022 to October 2023, the DTO campaign had morphed into a betterment phase to transform neighbourhoods and build on the legacy work from year one of the programme (2021- 2022). This was backed up by intensive enforcement and clean up activity in highlighted ‘hotspot’ neighbourhoods. The accepted aim of this programme was to ‘make a difference’ by undertaking work which was more than the first version of the DTO campaign. This included visibly improving areas, ensuring detailed attention and physical improvements that were not always deliverable as part of routine work.

The report also outlined proposals on how the legacy of DTO campaign would become embedded and what this would look like moving forward. There was a recognition that given the work completed over the last two iterations of DTO, a sustainable approach was needed to ensure previous gains would not be lost and a more durable model be adopted moving forward which would meet the needs of the borough, the residents and ensures a clean environment for all.

Integral to the option approved at cabinet in September 2022 was a targeted approach in the known hotspot locations with enforcement and a dedicated clean-up to influence a sustained behaviour change amongst residents.

The report looked at targeted ‘hot spot enforcement and clean-up work. Focused activity involved consistent enforcement and clean-up work across five of the inner Oldham-town wards, namely: Alexandra, Medlock Vale, St. Marys, Waterhead and Werneth. Coupled with this work, the Council’s Enforcement Officers and Environment Marshals served legal notices to ensure private yards were cleared and that any defects were resolved. Part of this work involved a range of visits, advice and enforcement actions undertaken, as follows:

            - 4,996 service requests (average of 416 per month)

            - 1,741 enforcement actions taken (average of 145 per month)

            - 41 prosecutions taken to court or submitted to legal

            - 166 FPNs served

The Don’t Trash Oldham campaign was one  ...  view the full minutes text for item 5.