BARNSLEY’S worst-hit streets for fly-tipping have been revealed and a councillor whose ward accounts for half of the list has urged local authority bosses to clean up their act after months of campaigning for tougher deterrents.
The Chronicle can reveal that Kingstone is officially the town’s worst area for recorded waste with four of its streets Blenheim Road, St George’s Road, Castle Street and Day Street all appearing in the top eight.
Nearby Doncaster Road and Osborne Street were also named, as were Goldthorpe’s Beever Street and Victoria Street.
Councillor Steve Bullcock, who represents the Kingstone ward, has been campaigning for tougher fines for those found responsible after just 32 people were handed fixed penalty notices last year, despite almost 6,000 reports of fly-tipping being logged.
He told the Chronicle: “One of my key pledges was to assist in tackling antisocial behaviour.
“This includes fly-tipping, graffiti, littering and other behaviours that affect our town.
“In reflection, I along with others have clearly tried to raise greater awareness among council officials and residents in the press, on the doorstep, or on social media regarding the blight of fly-tipping.
“Our council and the judiciary have also responded favourably by investigating and imposing large fines against identified perpetrators in a serious attempt to win this battle and make our town cleaner and more desirable for residents and visitors alike.
“This is welcomed we have heard stories of vehicles involved in fly-tipping being crushed.
“But what is being done about Mr X, who decides to walk out of his front door and fly-tips a bag of domestic waste in the nearest backings?
“No point in crushing his car he didn’t use one, he simply walked out of the front door.
“For example, we in Kingstone do not suffer with fly-tipped waste from a new bathroom or building project.
“It is the worst kind of fly-tipping: bags of toxic, rotting food waste, the type that feeds and attracts vermin.
“Looking at the council’s own statistics, the number of incidents are certainly not coming down.
“For example, in Kingstone alone the numbers are travelling in the opposite direction and are sadly increasing.
“If you do know who the perpetrators are, you owe it to your neighbours to report suspicions to the council to allow investigations we cannot continue to ignore the systematic trashing of our communities.
“Our council needs to establish why fly-tipping continues to flourish.”
The cost of collecting and disposing of illegally dumped waste rose sharply to £429,397 last year, an increase of more than £130,000 on the previous year.
Councillor James Higginbottom, cabinet spokesperson for environment and highways, said fly-tipping continued to have a ‘significant impact’ on communities across the borough.
“Costs have continued to rise due to new things such as persistent organic pollutants regulations, which demand affected furniture being separated for incineration,” he added.
“However, the cost per removal for last year is in line with the average cost per removal over the last decade.
“We have a proactive enforcement team who carried out over 1,000 fly-tipping and waste-related investigations in 2025.
“This saw us issue 98 fixed penalty notices for environmental offences, 32 of which were for fly-tipping, with fines totalling £5,800.
“We also seized 11 vehicles during investigations.
“We’ll continue to take strong action against those who scourge our borough, but we’re not resting on our laurels.
“That’s why we’ve invested £3.5m into our Love Where You Live programme this year, including a new housing and environmental taskforce to provide targeted support to clean up communities across Barnsley and support residents to dispose of their waste both lawfully and safely.
“They’ve delivered 80 days across 15 wards since its introduction, removing 81 tonnes of fly-tipping and almost 11,000 purple bags of waste thanks to 583 hours of support from volunteers.”
