Some of the county’s most attractive picnic areas are being reduced to squalid tips where no-one but the local rat would risk a bite to eat.

    The fly tippers are also taking advantage of the skip service provided by Fermanagh District Council at depots around the county. In Belleek, for instance, Council staff are having to cart away twice as much rubbish as the residents of the village would normally produce because people from across the Border are abusing the facility.

    Those involved haven’t gone as far as mooning at the closed circuit television cameras which monitor some skip sites but their bare faced cheek is causing the Council concern.

    Mr. Gerry Knox, the Council’s director of technical services, admits that such illegal dumping is “very difficult to control” but warns that a day of reckoning is coming. The Council has been collecting the registration details of the vehicles involved and gathering information on the identities of the drivers. It is threatening prosecution and warning of hefty penalties for anyone caught and convicted.

    Mr. Knox points out that it is not just the Council’s skip sites the dumpers are taking advantage of but any amenity area close to the Border, including picnic sites, where a bin is provided for the convenience of tourists and passers by. One of the worst examples of this is the car park on the main Enniskillen to Belcoo road, close to the village. It offers beautiful views across Lough Macnean towards Cuilcagh Mountain and Hanging Rock - if you can see either over the mounds of rubbish!

    As for an al fresco dining opportunity?

    Well you can tell it’s no picnic. The people who stop here leave behind everything from old mattresses and fridges to television sets and bits of cars. And it isn’t just household waste that is finding a new home in Fermanagh. Shops and other businesses across the Border are making use of the “free” service.

    Fermanagh rate-payers are not just having to fork out for the extra collections from the various skip depots and picnic sites, they are having to foot the bill for landfill tax.

    “That is the issue that concerns us greatly,” Mr. Knox admits.

    Belleek, Garrison, Rosslea and Belcoo are the most exploited facilities. In Belleek there are four or five skips and they require emptying five or six times a week. That is an average of 20 skip loads of rubbish a week. “There should be only 10,” explains Mr. Knox.

    In Garrison and Rosslea the level of cross-Border dumping has led to a 60 per cent increase in the amount of waste the Council has to dispose of.