'People flytip toilets with human faeces'

Sefton Council is installing more CCTV cameras in flytipping hotspots to try and increase enforcement action

Flytippers illegally dump "absolutely anything" - even "toilets with human faeces" - and it is attracting rats to neighbourhoods, say workers at a Merseyside local authority.

Sefton Council warned there was a rise in flytipping and that it was installing more CCTV cameras in hotspots to try and increase enforcement action.

Waste operative Chris Schofield said as well as the faeces, he had seen two bags of rubbish dumped in an alley as he and a colleague drove away after clearing it. Chris Beckinsdale, area cleansing officer, said it was "an endless fight".

It comes as Keep Britain Tidy urges people not to hire traders without permits to take away rubbish as people could face a £400 fine.

During a routine sweep of an alleyway, Mr Schofield said he and his colleague Leon Hart found bricks, a vacuum cleaner and an exercise bike, as well as a mattress.

Mr Schofield said: "We've found toilets with human faeces, we've found sinks. Anything you can think of but the amount of rats it brings."

He said: "We cleaned an alleyway down the road and once we had cleared it, we only did a u-turn and there were two bags thrown in that alleyway," he said.

The pair said residents were furious about flytipping and were often stopped in the street with reports of illegal rubbish being dumped in their area.

The illegally dumped waste attracts rats, says waste operative Chris Schofield

Mr Schofield said: "Someone will have paid for a man on a van to come and take it and [they're] only dumping it here because [they] haven't got a permit to go to tip."

Peter Moore, the council's head of highways and public protection, said "it might not be the cheap option" for residents, "because if they end up getting their waste dumped around the corner, and they end up with the fixed penalty notice, it's going to cost them a lot more".

Leon Hart (pictured) and Chris Schofield found a mattress among items dumped in a daily check of neighbourhoods in Sefton

Mr Moore warned people to "think twice" about cheap offers on social media.

"If you're going to use someone, then get a waste carrier's licence number from them, check it on the Environment Agency website and then make sure you get a receipt," he said.

Keep Britain Tidy has released research to support its new Fight Flytipping Fortnight campaign, which found two in five flytipping incidents were now reported to be left by rogue operators rather than individuals.