NEWPORT council has the third highest annual spend to clear up fly tipping out of the 22 Welsh authorities, spending just under £150,000 during the last financial year, according to a report.

In 2011 to 2012, the council spent £128,526 on clearing up fly tipping – waste dumped illegally instead of in an authorised rubbish dump.

But this figure dramatically rose in the last financial year to £149,791, according to a Welsh Government report, which is based on returns made to the Flycapture database of fly tipping incidents by local authorities in Wales.

The figures show these costs resulted from 1,982 separate fly tipping incidents in Newport in the 2012 to 2013 period.

Cardiff Council tops the list, spending £524,845 in the last financial year, followed by Rhondda Cynon Taff who spent £153,821 in the same period.

Across Wales, councils spent £1.8 million clearing up fly tipping in 2012/13. Household items are the highest source of fly tipping in Newport, with 898 incidents resulting from this in 2012 to 2013.

The second highest is household black bags of which there were 424 incidents in the same period. Figures show the majority of fly tipping occurs on the highway, with 1,300 incidents in 2012 to 2013, and there were 468 incidents of fly tipping on council land in the same period.

In Gwent, Blaenau Gwent has the lowest spend, of £15,646. Torfaen spent £21,121, Monmouthshire spent £21,420 and Caerphilly spent £ 92,358 in the same period. In the last five years, this has resulted in eight people in Newport receiving fines after prosecution. While in Caerphilly, 65 fines were issued in the same period after prosecution in comparison to Torfaen where eight people were fined.

A total of 23 people were fined in Blaenau Gwent and in Monmouthshire no fines were issued. In the last five years, 1,350 warning letters and 109 fixed penalty notices were issued for fly tipping offences within Newport.

The data is based on 12 separate monthly returns to the Flycapture database that all local authorities in Wales entered between April 2012 and March 2013.

A spokeswoman for Newport council said in the last few years there has been an increase in the cost of sending waste to landfill and there has been a rise in dealing with hazardous waste, such as asbestos, which is more expensive to process.

She said: “We have focused on education and engagement but we will continue to prosecute where appropriate.”

Visit newport.gov.uk/recycling for more information.