CCTV a ‘legal minefield’ for Council to catch illegal dumpers

From this week’s Galway City Tribune – The use of CCTV cameras to catch the culprits of illegal dumping remains a legal minefield for the City Council, as confusion over the right to privacy threatens to undermine the use of footage in pursuing convictions.

This comes as Waterford City and County Council was reprimanded by the Data Protection Commissioner for its use of CCTV to monitor public activity – in breach of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) related to the use of surveillance to monitor illegal dumping.

The Commissioner found that neither the Litter Pollution Act nor the Waste Management Act provide a lawful basis to use CCTV to identify illegal dumpers.

A spokesperson for Galway City Council confirmed to the Galway City Tribune that the local authority was aware of cases such as that in Waterford, and while City Hall had not undergone an investigation by the Commissioner, it was mindful of rulings in other jurisdictions.

“There are significant restrictions on the use of CCTV under GDPR, but it’s not just because of GDPR coming in two years ago. There were always issues around what you could and couldn’t do with cameras.”

There have been calls recently to use CCTV to curb illegal dumping at bottle banks, with those on the Western Distributor Road drawing the ire of residents due to an increase in littering at the recycling facility.

This is a shortened preview version of this article. To read the rest of the story, see this week’s Galway City Tribune. You can buy a digital edition HERE.