Flytipping has cost Dover district taxpayers more than £58,000 in the past year – but not a single offender was fined.

Figures revealed by the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs this week show there were 903 incidents of flytipping between April 2012 and March 2013, the majority of them on or alongside the highway.

There were 180 incidents in which black bags were dumped, 460 involved household or commercial waste, 34 incidents involved tyres, 45 were building material and eight involved asbestos.

It cost the council £24,000 to clear small van loads, £22,885 to clear Transit van loads and £2,800 for material that had to be collected by tipper lorries. The total cost of removal was £58,451.

Action was taken in 531 cases, including 245 investigations – costing £8,085 – and 82 warning letters were issued, costing £2,706. The other 204 actions were classed as “duty of care” and cost £6,732.

But there were no prosecutions, no fixed penalty notices and no fines.

While local authorities throughout England have reported a 4% decrease in the number of incidents in 2012-13 – down to 711,000 – the number in Dover district increased dramatically from 695 the previous year and there were also increases in the previous two years.