ROMSEY residents have hit out at a pile of rubbish that was discovered dumped beside a road.

Wooden furniture, an airer and household waste were all found discarded in Highwood Lane.

The fly-tip was spotted by Lucy Orr when she was walking her dog on Monday, January 20.

The 51-year-old from Avon Crescent said: "I saw the rubbish just before 2pm when I spotted waste in the trees and I believe it was dumped on Sunday night when he road was closed.

"People seem to dump anything anywhere now and there is no respect for the countryside and wildlife; they think they can get away with it.

"The rubbish was between Green Lane and the houses so I am guessing it is someone who has a good knowledge of the area."

Lucy added: "There seems to be quite a bit of fly-tipping at the moment and I reported it to the council, who cleared it away on Tuesday.

"It is a shame they have to spend money doing this when there are other things to do; there is no excuse for dumping rubbish like this because we have facilities to take these items and normal household items can be taken to the dump for free.

"There must be some way of stopping this from happening, but there seems to be no deterrent because you cannot put cameras everywhere.

"There does not seem to be any way of contacting them as these people are hard to track down."

Romsey town centre manager, Mark Edgerley, said: "There has never been a need to fly-tip and a lot of the problem is rubbish gets loaded on the back of transit trucks and they dump it while driving down lanes.

"I do not think people realise there was someone who was fined 3,000 for a fly-tip in Chilworth recently.

"It was not the carrier who was prosecuted, but it was the original owner of the waste who was fined."

He added: "For £300 you can get a skip from Ace Liftaway and they also have a small truck now that they will use for rubbish."

Environmental portfolio holder, cllr Alison Johnston, said: “Fly-tipping is simply inexcusable and a blight on our countryside. "Having now cleared the waste, we will continue to investigate and if we discover sufficient evidence, we will seek to prosecute those responsible.

“The best thing residents can do to help prevent their waste being dumped, is to check that their waste carrier is licensed through the Environment Agency website.

"Anyone who has information about this specific fly-tip can speak to our environmental service in complete confidence via 01794 527700 or 01264 368000.”