Litter warden finds suitcase of sex toys among items dumped illegally on roadside
Suitcase containing 45 sex toys abandoned on a roadside in East Meath.
A litter warden who reckons at least 10,000 household rubbish bags have been dumped across Meath since Covid-19, has revealed that the strangest item he has found discarded along the roadside was a suitcase full of sex toys.
Alan Nolan, who also discovered 22 bags of cannabis dumped in East Meath last year says he couldn't believe it when he opened the suitcase after being alerted by a member of the public.
He also found another sex toy and lubricant strewn in the ditches in Gormanstown just last week.
"I don't often get surprised at this stage at the stuff that people dump but last September we got a call from a lady about illegal dumping at the side of the road at Beamore, which included a large suitcase.
"I told her not to touch anything until we arrived in case there was any evidence. We looked at the suitcase for any markings or any travel labels on it but there was nothing.
"When we opened it, there were over 40 sex toys of all descriptions. It just completely surprised and baffled me. Why would someone just dump them on the roadside.
"Last week while clearing up more rubbish dumped in Gormanston, we came across another sex toy and lubricant. These things are completely recyclable for free because they are battery operated."
Another thing you don't expect to find littering the roadside are drugs but Alan detected 22 black bags of cannabis plants containing cannabinoid-rich buds in Julianstown last February.
"It's getting more prevalent. In the last three years, I have come across about eight incidents of illegal dumping of between ten and twenty bags of compost and used cannabis plants along roads in areas like Ashbourne, Garristown, Julianstown, Bettystown and Bellewstown.
Sifting through up to a dozen bags of other people's rubbish has become a daily task for the litter warden who says cases of illegal dumping continue to rise due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
Part of the marked increase, he believes, can be attributed to people now working from home who would otherwise dispose of their rubbish at their workplace.
"In the first five weeks of the pandemic, the calls reporting illegal dumping rose by about 40% and our workload I'd say has increased by 70% since then," he said.
"When people are at home, they eat more. People were buying more food than normal and all of a sudden they had two sliced pans that were out of date and various vegetables that had rotted. All this dumped food leads to vermin problems in that area.
"I have to deal with up to 12 bags of rubbish each day and sift through every bit of waste in an effort to find evidence. Some days there is none which is disheartening but out of ten bags, we find evidence in about five of them.
"These people will slip up and we will always catch them," he laughed.
Alan said in one incident, "There was one serial dumper who left two bags of rubbish over eight consecutive weeks and finally, we found a Chinese takeaway box in one of the bags with their name on it so they received a €1000 fine."
In the last year, Alan says he has encountered genuine cases where people dumped their waste because they didn't feel they had a choice.
"There are a lot of people under pressure with cuts in wages during these times.
"One woman I traced from the contents of a discarded black bag was at her wits end trying to cope financially and she was afraid to ask for help. I'd say she had been crying a lot and had slept little in recent months.
"The council cleared the rubbish from her garden and we put her in touch with St Vincent de Paul. I called back a few months later and she looked great - like a weight had been lifted. She couldn't thank me enough but we are here to try and help at the end of the day."
The latest figures obtained from Meath County Council show that it cost €4,148,311 in 2018 to clean up illegal dumping across the country.
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