'Asbestos dump by my home took months to be cleared'

2 hours ago

Gina MillsonLancashire political reporter

News image — William Banks says he reported the flytipping to Blackpool Council last year

BBC An image of William Banks, standing in the entrance to the alley way, there is a silver coloured metal gate behind his left shoulder and a silver coloured industrial bin with a black lid over his right shoulder. William is a balding man with a beard, he is smiling and wearing blue rimmed glasses. He is wearing a green jacket over a blue checked shirt. — William Banks says he reported the flytipping to Blackpool Council last year

A man who lives near to where concrete asbestos was illegally dumped is criticising a council for failing to clear it up for months and downplaying potential health risks.

William Banks lives on Buchanan Street, Blackpool, and says in April 2025 an alleyway behind his home was covered in construction waste.

He says he told Blackpool Council, which took months to remove the bulk of it, leaving fragments that were only scraped up two weeks ago.

The council said the landlord, who was not responsible for the dumping, had removed most of it and its "Environmental Protection team quickly arranged for the removal of the rest". It said staff went to the site recently and found "no residual asbestos".

William Banks An image of a back alley with piles of broken asbestos concrete and other rubbish. — Concrete asbestos and other rubbish were dumped in a back alley

Banks said: "I went down there and took images of broken asbestos pieces that were left and sent that to the council, it was broken and fibres can leak from that and come into your house."

He believes it has taken this long to clean up because of the postcode he lives in.

"I feel that because this is FY1 and not FY4, it wasn't picked up as quickly as it could be and I think some lazy stereotypes have gone into it, quite frankly I'm not happy with the situation - we need a council that when it sees toxic waste will pick up toxic waste," he said.

FY1 covers the centre of the town, while FY4 covers the southern suburbs of Blackpool where some of the most expensive properties are located.

"People live here, we work really hard to make it a nice place and, when you get things like not picking asbestos up for nearly 10 months, it really makes you disheartened."

In a recent letter to residents, seen by the BBC, the council calls the asbestos "low risk" but also directs anyone who is worried to contact their GP, something Banks is calling a "mixed message".

He now wants lessons to be learned from this: "It needs to be done instantly with wraparound care saying, 'look this has been there, we don't know how long, are you aware of the risks? Get yourself to the doctor if you need to'."

'Advice in letter'

A spokesperson for Blackpool Council said: "Our Environmental Protection team received a report last year regarding the presence of some asbestos materials in an unadopted alley.

"Normally Blackpool Council is not responsible for rubbish dumped on private land or unadopted roads and alleyways but we did follow up this report with further investigation.

"We also recently sent out staff again to look at the alleyway and found there was no residual asbestos left, the removal was classed as a low level-unlicensed risk - if it had been a higher risk type then we would have had to instruct specialist removal.

"We also provided in the letter advice and points of contact for anyone who may still have any concerns about the material."

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