Fly-tipping is rife – on our residential streets, roads, in parks and in our rivers.
In one day, QWAG volunteers removed over 200 shopping bags from the banks of the River Quaggy at Lee Green near where the river flows across the borough boundary from Greenwich into Lewisham.
The area sees much the same kind of casual littering, overflowing bins, and mis-used recycling bins as other areas, but the scale of this dumping over many months was exceptional.
QWAG, local residents and regulars at the nearby Duke of Edinburgh pub opposite the dumping location on the Lee High Road had spotted the person who was doing the dumping.
There are photographs and video clips of the person including them claiming they had permission – from the Metropolitan Police – to dump their waste on the river, which is unlikely.
When we looked into the hundreds of orange Sainsbury and light blue Savers shopping bags, we detected a trend.
The bags were stuffed with the person’s medical waste – masses of bloodied plasters and cotton wool – along with take away coffee cups and other detritus.
The person clearly had lasting health issues. They might also benefit from getting other professional care.
They also needed to be disabused of their claim about their dumping habits being okay.
QWAG removed the person’s 200+ bags of medical and other waste from the Quaggy’s banks on the Lee High Road.
Pollution and dumping of any kind are not okay, but medical waste entering our rivers is a particular concern.
After clearing the dumped bags, the problem seemed to stop. We thought the person has changed their ways or moved away.
In Spring 2026, we found the same problem.
This time the dumping is on the Greenwich side of the borough boundary – where the Quaggy flows at Osborn Terrace before flowing beneath the Lee Road near the Tigers Head pubs – and across the border into Lewisham borough.
