Brussels (Eurotoday) – Politician Jeroen Van Loy wants tobacco companies to pay for cleaning cigarette butts. Jo Brouns supports reviving Zuhal Demir’s plan to charge them €25.5M. In 2024, 6,000 littering fines were issued, mostly for cigarette butts.
A politician named Jeroen Van Loy is worried about cigarette butts littering the streets. Another politician, Jo Brouns, said that having small ashtrays people can carry could help. Van Loy thinks that’s not enough and wants the tobacco companies to pay for cleaning up cigarette butts.
A different politician, Zuhal Demir, had a plan for that. She wanted cigarette companies to pay 25.5 million euros to help clean up all the trash in Flanders, which costs over 150 million euros every year.
She mentioned that cigarette butts are bad for the environment because they have tiny pieces of plastic and take a long time to go away. Brouns said he’s going to bring back that plan and talk to the tobacco companies about it. This is like a rule that says companies have to take care of the trash their products make.
The tobacco producers will certainly be included,
according to Brouns.
How can cigarette litter be reduced effectively?
Van Loy is happy that Brouns wants to make the tobacco companies pay for cleaning up cigarette butts. He says it’s not fair that taxpayers have to pay for that when the companies make a lot of money from cigarettes. He wants the companies to pay the whole cost.
He mentioned that England is doing something similar, where they are trying to make tobacco companies pay for all the cigarette butts that get thrown away. Governments want to make sure that companies that pollute have to clean up after themselves.
In 2024, over 6,000 people were caught littering, confirmed by the Flemish Public Waste Agency (OVAM). The number of fines for littering has gone up a lot since 2020. Antwerp is the city that gives out the most fines (6,309). The government says this shows they are taking the problem seriously. But even with more fines, people still drop trash, especially cigarette butts.
That is an impressive increase in the number of GAS fines,
said Minister Brouns.
According to Brouns, many smokers don’t think cigarette butts are trash, but they are really bad for the environment. They have plastic and chemicals that can affect the soil and water. It takes a long time for cigarette butts to break down, and they blank”>make the environment sick.
The government is trying to make people stop littering by putting out ashtrays, telling people about the problem, and sending secret officers to catch people. But it’s hard to change how people act. They mentioned that cities need to keep telling people about the harm cigarette butts cause and how to throw them away properly.
Comments
5 responses to “Litter Fines Tripled Since 2020 as Tobacco Firms Face €25.5M Bill”
-
Cigarette butts littering our streets? Shocking! Who would have thought that a product designed to go up in smoke could leave such a messy footprint? 😂 Maybe they should just hand out tiny ashtrays with every pack—because nothing says “I care” quite like a portable bin for your rubbish! 🗑️💨
-
Great to see our politicians finally tackling the pressing issue of rogue cigarette butts; I mean, who needs a clean city when there are ashtray fashion statements to be made, right? 🤔💸 Just love how the tobacco giants are about to cough up a cool €25.5M—better start saving those pennies, lads! 😏
-
Oh, brilliant! Because nothing says “responsibility” quite like a €25.5M bill for a mess you made—next, we’ll have them charging us for breathing their smoke! 😏💨
-
Oh, splendid! Because nothing says responsible corporate citizenship like tobacco companies finally paying for the mess they created—why stop at €25.5M? Let’s just slap a “clean-up fee” on every pack sold and call it a day, eh? 💸🧹
-
Oh, brilliant idea, let’s charge the tobacco companies €25.5M for cleaning up their mess! Because clearly, throwing butts on the street is just a cheeky little hobby of the locals, right? 😏🚬
Last News
A Plea for the Release of 95-Year-Old Chairman Lee from Pretrial Detention in South Korea
For a month, Chairman Lee (Lee Man Hee, born in 1931), the founder and spiritual head of the Shincheonji Church, has been in pretrial detention since his arrest on June 24, 2026, making him possibly the oldest prisoner in the world, despite not being found guilty of any crime.
This
Offener Widerstand gegen Alice Weidel
Z
Britain’s Leadership Crisis: A Symptom, Not the Disease
The question of whether Andy Burnham would make a better prime minister than Keir Starmer misses the point entirely. Britain’s political crisis runs far deeper than personalities, campaign skills or messaging strate
Zelenskyy Appoints New Head of Ukraine’s Army
Is Everyone Aboard the Burnham Bus?
They analyze the funding mechanism for the bus fare plan. Chancellor John Healey claims it won’t burden British taxpayers, but details raise funding concerns.
At the Farnborough Air Show, there’s a chance to discuss defe
EU Pledge to Ukraine: "Our Support is Unwavering"
Modern wars are won “not only by military strength but by drones and cutting-edge technologies.”
So says Andrius Kubilius, Commissioner for Defence and Space who was speaking after the European Commission and Ukraine signed a major new defence industrial partnership.
The EU says the move marks a “major step forward” in the integration of the European and Ukrainian defence industries.
The Commiss
Value of the 2026 World Cup Trophy
Officially, the World Cup trophy is crafted from pure gold. It stands 36.5 cm tall and weighs 6
Drone Strikes by Ukraine Intensify Pressure on Russian Economy
Initially, Moscow planned to reduce military spending this year, but it has surged, making up nearly half of government spending in the second quarter, accordi
Everyone Watches Oil While Iran Turns to Maritime Moves.
By Tuesday night, after four consecutive nights of strikes, Iranian missiles and drones continue to target power and desalination infrastructure along Kuwait’s southern coast. The primary target remains the Shuaiba complex, a dense stretch of turbines and water treatment units south of Kuwait City where crews have fought fires across multiple sectors as generating units went dark. Kuwait draws n
Leave a Reply