Now the bin police get the power to take your car away

Under laws to be introduced next year, bin wardens working for councils will be able to order drivers to stop and then search their cars for black bags of household refuse.

They will be entitled to impound a family car if they think it is being used to dump rubbish unlawfully.

This is the latest escalation of a campaign which has made it a crime to leave out too many rubbish bags, put them out at the

wrong time, or fill wheelie bins too full. Ministers announced the new stop-and- search powers for bin police as they released figures showing a massive jump in flytipping in England in the 12 months up to this spring.

Most of this, however, did not involve the commercial or construction waste most often associated with eyesore dumping.

The big rise came in household rubbish abandoned by roadsides, a huge proportion of it in singlydumped black bags of the kind now pursued by council bin police.

More than half of all "fly-tips" were of home rubbish, a 10 per cent increase on levels reported in 2006.

The jump in fly-tipping in areas which have introduced fortnightly rubbish collections was nearly three times bigger than in places where rubbish is still collected once a week.

According to figures calculated by the Taxpayers' Alliance pressure group, in areas with fortnightly rubbish collections, the increase was 11.89 per cent. In places with weekly collections, the rise was 4.24 per cent.

MPs blamed the increase in dumped rubbish on fortnightly bin collections and overbearing rubbish collection rules imposed by the Government and local councils in an effort to force families to cut the amount of waste they put out and recycle more.

Tory MP and former local government minister Sir Paul Beresford said: "People fear the way bins are inspected and the threat of fines and charges. These fly-tipping figures are the predictable result.

"This is the point where the Government should be working with people, not threatening new laws against them."

Corin Taylor of the Taxpayers' Alliance said: "Following the spread of reduced and fortnightly rubbish collections, punishments for people who break the rules, and the threat of charging for rubbish collection, it is not surprising that people are trying to find other ways to get rid of their rubbish.

"The Government is always looking for more powers to push people into line - so now we get stop-andsearch rights for council wardens. But they just won't work."

A paper setting out the new powers for bin wardens will be published by the Environement, Food and Rural Affairs Secretary Hilary Benn in the New Year.

The consultation will pave the way for regulations establishing town hall stop-and-search powers by the end of 2008.

The regulations can be brought in without full-scale new legislation under the terms of the 2005 Clean Neighbourhoods and Environment Act, the law which first gave council wardens the right to impose on-the- spot fines for litter offences.

Town halls are also pressing for powers to levy pay-as-you-throw rubbish taxes on household bins to encourage families to cut the amount of rubbish they leave out.

Ministers also want to give them the right to make charges for the first time for leaving rubbish at council dumps.

The unpopularity of these measures and of fortnightly collections was underlined by the huge public response to the Daily Mail's Great Bin Revolt campaign, and a voters' rebellion against them in local elections in May.