A Derbyshire council’s fines for BBQs, fires and dog fouling have been compared to the “Emperor’s new clothes” with no fines issued in three years

A Derbyshire council’s fines for BBQs, fires and dog fouling have been compared to the “Emperor’s new clothes” with no fines issued in three years.

Derbyshire Dales District Council has agreed to extend its public space protection order for another three years, following its adoption in 2022, introducing £100 fines for dog fouling, dogs off leads and BBQs and fires on council land.

However, in the first three-year term of the order, no fines have been issued and no prosecutions have been pursued against people breaching the order.

This is because the legal order is not enforced by any officers, but can be deployed by the police.

Despite this, the order has been readopted for a further three years, with new additions added to outlaw BBQs or open fires in public areas – with exclusions for campsites and specific small gas stoves.

This led to Cllr Sue Hobson, Conservative, to question: “What is the point of them then? We have had four years of PSPOs and we haven’t given a ticket for anything.”

Vicky Winfield, the council’s neighbourhood manager, responded: “I think we are quite lucky in the Dales in that we don’t have a massive issue in any of the areas that we are covering.

“The signage is a deterrent. On our land we may be able to enforce in the future.”

She said the approach the council had was “manageable” for a “limited” issue, “considering how many people visit us”.

Ms Winfield said: “We haven’t really been in the situation to need to put that enforcement in place at this time, but that could change.”

Cllr Hobson said: “It is like the Emperor’s clothes that we have this enforcement and we put signs up but we are not doing anything about it.

“I am sure if you went up to Stanton Peak nearly every weekend during the summer there are people having fires there. This is an issue.

“Sooner or later there is going to be a really serious fire. We need positive enforcement otherwise it is just a sign.”

Cllr Stuart Lees, Conservative, said: “Over my fire service career I spent many hours putting out fires along the River Dove and the surrounding areas and moorland fires, particularly on Beeley Moor, you’d sometimes be up there for weeks.

“I think we should be doing more to do something. We have got no encouragement, we should be putting some money forward to employ an enforcement officer.

“One little penalty notice could save thousands and thousands of pounds on a moor putting a fire out for a month, that starts out as a little BBQ fire.

“We need to stick to our guns and get some money to the police or fire to get this efficiently working.”

Ms Winfield said: “The problem with enforcement is that you are never going to be in the right place at the right time. The area that we are looking at is massive.”

She said incidents were likely to take place in the evenings and the weekends and she did not want to appoint an “isolated” officer to be put in that position.

Ms Winfield said: “It is about the reality of the person being on the site at the time of the offence.”

Cllr Gareth Gee, Derbyshire First, said: “If we haven’t really got any hope of catching anybody and if we haven’t caught anybody and we never prosecute anybody, we haven’t prosecuted anybody for the last four years, is it worth the time to write to the Secretary of State to increase the fine?”

Ms Winfield said the proposed letters to the Government was a united effort with councils where some authorities do have enforcement in place to issue fines.

Councillors agreed to expand the ban on BBQs and open fires from council land to all public open spaces.

An exception for gas-powered stoves weighing less than 600 grams (excluding fuel) and emitting energy of less than 3,000 watts was added to enable Duke of Edinburgh students and Mountain Rescue personnel to carry out their activities unrestricted.

Cllr Peter Dobbs, Liberal Democrat, said that despite no fines being issued, the council had succeeded in “moving the dial” and that the issue was about “general education” of the public.

In November 2022, councillors opted not to expand the ban to moorland and other public areas due to 26 reports of fires caused by campfires and barbecues in the Derbyshire Dales in the six months from April to September.

A new council report discussed this month detailed that in 2024 there were 28 outdoor fires reported by the fire service, with 17 reported to the district council – with some overlap.

Six incidents have been reported to the district council this year.