The report examines the work of central and local government agencies and departments in the fight against environmental crime. The Committee applauds DEFRA for its consultations on fly-tipping. It is important that the person who is prosecuted for fly-tipping should not be the householder, if someone else is responsible for the actual fly-tipping. Special attention must be paid to the illegal dumping of construction, excavation and demotion wastes. The Environment Agency must be given appropriate levels of funding and appropriate powers. For example, local authorities and the Agency do not have computerised access to the records of the Driving and Vehicle Licensing Agency but have to obtain this information by post. The law should facilitate the investigation and prosecution of companies which pay for illegal advertising in the form of fly-posting, and maximum sentences for fly-posting should be raised further. Local authorities should ensure that best practice is always followed when dealing with litter and graffiti, and should liaise with local businesses which are known sources of litter. Every local authority should ensure that data on noise nuisance is regularly compiled and sent to DEFRA or the Chartered Institute of Environmental Health; this will aid policy makers.

The drive for harmonisation of environmental criminal standards at both the international and European level emerges from the increasing recognition of the scale and seriousness of environmental crime, the need to strengthen mechanisms of police and judicial interstate cooperation to combat cross-border crime, and the objective to ensure fair competition in a global economy and an integrated EU common market. The harmonisation of environmental criminal law requires a competent institutional framework able to convey the need for criminalisation of environmental harm while not overriding national aspirations to sovereignty in criminal matters. The book Environmental Criminal Liability and Enforcement in European and International Law assesses legal, theoretical and practical questions of harmonisation of national environmental criminal law and the mechanisms for cooperation by sovereign states under European and International Law, with a particular emphasis on legislative developments in the European Union, the Council of Europe and other international institutions, assessing the case for an extension of the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court over international environmental crimes.