Written Question·Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs·UIN 66606
Waste: Crime
Tabled: 10 July 2025
Answered: 18 July 2025
Question
Gareth Snell
Labour (Co-op) — Stoke-on-Trent Central
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what recent estimate his Department has made of the annual cost to the public purse of (a) waste crime and (b) illegal waste exports.
Answer
Mary CreaghThe Environmental Services Association (ESA) estimated in 2021 that waste crime costs the economy in England about £1 billion per year of which at least £42 million per year could be attributed to illegal waste exports. (see here: ESA_Cost_of_Waste_Crime.pdf.) The same report estimates that £499 million or 54% is borne by the public sector.