In its continued efforts to stamp out fly-tipping in the borough, officers from Barking and Dagenham Council have seized two vehicles that were caught dumping rubbish.

The first vehicle was seized during a joint operation with the police - Operation Whitemouth - where vehicles were randomly stopped to check for road safety worthiness. The van was pulled in by chance and officers quickly realised it was a vehicle of interest as it had been caught fly-tipping in Dagenham in May this year.

The vehicle was seized, and the driver was also arrested by the police for separate offences.

A second van was seized as part of an early morning operation following it being linked to two separate fly-tipping incidents in Dagenham captured on CCTV at one of our fly-tipping hot spots.

Both vehicles are now being stored in the council’s compound while the investigations continue.

Councillor Syed Ghani, Cabinet Member for Enforcement and Community Safety said: “These seizures and subsequent actions demonstrate our zero-tolerance of fly-tipping and dumping on our borough’s streets.

“I hope these two incidents show that if you’re going to fly-tip in the borough and we catch you, we will take strong enforcement action against you. The council takes these sort of offence very seriously and we will do everything we can find the perpetrators.”

Residents of Barking and Dagenham can either have their rubbish collected every two weeks, take it to Frizlands Lane Recycling Centre for free or pay a small fee to have bulky items collected from their home.