NSW councils to issue fines for abandoned shopping trolleys in new proposal

Thousands of abandoned trolleys need to be recovered every year but in these suburbs they have become the scourge of the neighbourhood. Check out the list.

Supermarket trolley dumpers be warned — the man overseeing a review into the state’s trolley plague wants to hit you with increased penalties.

Oatley Liberal MP Mark Coure said: “I support increasing penalties to ensure councils have got the power to fine and can deal properly with these abandoned items, full stop.”

Local Government Minister Shelley Hancock is conducting a review into the state’s dumping laws, with changes expected to be made early next year.

A briefing paper obtained exclusively by The Saturday Telegraph has revealed more than 900 trolleys are removed from stormwater networks annually.

Abandoned trolleys dumped in bushland in Sydney.

Nearly three-quarters (73 per cent) of those who responded to a government issues paper said the laws are not adequate for shopping trolleys.

“The NSW Government recognises that there are great supermarket operators out there and that voluntary options such as trolley trackers, trolley collectors and coin deposit schemes have made a difference,” Mr Coure said.

“The community has told us these voluntary options are not enough to fix the widespread issues.”

Figures from dumped goods reporting app Snap Send Solve reveal there were 9506 reports of dumped trolleys in NSW in 2020.

There were nearly 10,000 reports of dumped trolleys in Sydney in 2020.

The Saturday Telegraph can reveal just 10 Sydney suburbs — including Riverwood, Glebe, Leichhardt, Parramatta, Rouse Hill, Miranda and Liverpool — are responsible for more than half of all NSW dumped trolley reports.

Under current laws councils can charge trolley owners a fee to impound and then release a trolley.

Numerous Sydney councils have previously said retailers who receive more than two infringement notices in one year should get a $5500 fine, as is done in some Queensland councils.

Nearly 900 trolleys are recovered from stormwater networks annually.

“These dumped trolleys make our area unsightly and supermarkets need to do more to ensure these are not left across our city,” Canterbury-Bankstown Mayor Khal Asfour said.

“I would support increasing fines. Maybe it is time for the government to provide money so councils can melt down abandoned trolleys, sell it, and invest that money into cleaning our cities.”

A Woolworths spokesman said: “We understand abandoned trolleys can be a nuisance and that’s why we invest millions in collection services to help mitigate their impact in the community”.

“We work closely with dedicated collection contractors who respond quickly to reports of abandoned trolleys to return them to our stores within 24 hours.

“They also conduct regular sweeps for abandoned trolleys in the streets surrounding our stores.”