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Councillors have backed plans to tackle the issue of trolley dumping after a significant amount were found in the Sirhowy River.

Blackwood councillor Nigel Dix has called on Caerphilly County Borough Council to take tougher enforcement action on supermarkets to protect the local environment.

At an Environment and Sustainability Scrutiny meeting, Cllr Dix proposed that the council adopt Section 99 of the Environmental Protection Act 1990. This would mean the local authority could remove abandoned trolleys from land and water, with the cost of the removal then being charged to the owners of the trolleys.

The owners of the trolleys would have six weeks to claim the trolleys before they are charged.

Independent councillor Dix said the current system was “failing”.

At the meeting, council waste management officer Rhodri Lloyd said that trolley dumping wasn’t an important issue in the county borough until it was raised at the meeting.

He added that there was a potential for the council to take in a lot of trolleys – which it did not have the facilities for – if the policy was adopted.

Officers estimated the cost of enforcing the policy at £100,000 – but the cost of adopting it was £0.

Cllr Dix questioned the cost estimation and said if the current system was working, then it wouldn’t cost so much to enforce the new policy.

Mark Williams, corporate director of economy and environment, said the £100,000 would go towards facilities to store the trolleys and the implementation of a legal process.

Plaid Cymru councillor Stephen Kent asked: “Isn’t it better to have something and not need it rather than need it and not have it?”

At the meeting, an amended motion was put forward by Cllr Carl Cuss to ramp up the current system – using Trolleywise and Keep Wales Tidy – and review the results in a year.

Trolleywise is a trolley retrieval service used by the council – residents are able to call the company or use an app to highlight incidents of dumping.

The amended motion was approved by the council’s scrutiny committee on June 28.

Following the decision, Cllr Dix said: “I’m willing to support anything that will keep trolleys off the streets and out of the rivers. The reason I put the notice of motion forward was to raise awareness about the issue, which I think I have done.

“Hopefully what the officers recommended will work, but I think the right decision would have been to adopt the policy. It gives the council teeth to tackle the issue.

“If it doesn’t work in a year’s time then I will be asking the council again to adopt the policy.”

The issue of abandoned trolleys was brought to Cllr Dix’s attention by Donna Szarun, who is the co-organiser of the Blackwood Action on Litter Community Group.

Donna and Sali Daniels began the litter picking group in 2018 with three members, but now have around 25 volunteers who litter pick every month.

Donna is also a member of a citizen science project which aims to help restore local river habitats. When conducting a survey, she spotted eight trolleys in a 500-metre stretch of the river.