AFTER The Gazette’s Freedom of Information request revealed a major spike in flytipping over the past five years, Renfrewshire Council had its say on the matter.

Bosses insisted a lot of work is being put into introducing new ways of eradicating flytipping.

And the council said the increase in the number of reports could be looked upon positively, as patrols are getting better at acting on incidents quickly.

A council spokesperson said: “Fly tipping is not only illegal, it is harmful to the environment and costly for our teams to remove.

“We are working hard to introduce measures to reduce fly tipping incidents in Renfrewshire including the introduction of our Rapid Response Team who proactively look for issues of fly tipping and tackle the issue immediately- which can explain the increased number of reports in the area.

“We are also working closely with other local authorities, Zero Waste Scotland and SEPA to examine best practice which we can bring into Renfrewshire to change the behaviour which makes this acceptable to some people.

“There is no excuse for fly tipping and we will continue to do all we can to prevent incidents taking place and catch offenders in the act.”