Marsh Folly workers are faced with health and safety risks due to members of the public illegally dumping items at the facility, including dead animals.

While the March Folly facility is intended to collect residential horticultural waste- such as Christmas trees — and commercial waste for composting, for years the facility has been left dealing with household waste left by the public.

Vincent Tuzo, who works at Marsh Folly, said he is disgusted by some of the items dumped there by members of the public.

Ripping open one bag filled with household waste on Tuesday, he said: “Sometimes people put dead animals in these bags. Dogs, cats, rotten meat. All sorts of things, and we have to put up with all of this.

“Sometimes the bags stay down here for two or three days and when you open it, the scent is terrible. Some people put garbage and grass in the same bag, and when we open up the bag we have to separate it. It’s not easy.”

He said that the improper disposal of the waste not only poses a health risk for staff at the facility, but it can cause serious damage to equipment if it’s not spotted in time.

“People bring rubble, metal, bottles. All of these things are supposed to go to Tynes Bay. People come up here with metal in their bags and if that goes in the machines and it breaks, who pays for that? We do, the public. I think some people don’t realise that we pay for it. They think it’s Government, but we pay the Government, so that’s our money.”

He said people have offered to help sort through the garbage to find out who is responsible for the dumping, but he said that it wouldn’t make a difference unless Government decided to get serious about the problem.

“They say they will prosecute them, but Government don’t do anything about it. I used to take down the numbers from the trucks and cars that were doing the dumping and give it to Government, but nothing ever came of it,” he said.

“They don’t care what happens down here. All they care about is that the work gets done. It’s been going on for years. UBP, PLP and now the OBA are on and still nothing’s going on. They have talked about how they are going to put cameras up they, that they are going to watch, but nobody’s doing nothing.”

He called on Government to take action by catching and punishing those responsible with steep fines to send a message.

“I’m not talking about fining then $200,” he said. “Fine then $1,000. Then we might see them stop.”