The Greater Manchester town where piles of raw meat are being dumped leaving residents baffled

Piles of raw meat is being found dumped around a neighbourhood in Stockport – and it’s “baffling” local residents. Red meat, chicken legs, and even eggs have been spotted by locals in Reddish – mostly around the Manchester Road Park area and the Whitehill industrial estate – but reports have also come from Heaton Moor near the railings of the train station.

The odd sightings were reported throughout 2023 according to Joanna Williams, Labour candidate for Reddish South, picking up in the summer and again before Christmas. Sometimes, piles of meat are found on an almost weekly basis, and shared on social media sites such as Facebook, usually in the mornings.

Ms Williams told the Local Democracy Reporting Service that the dumped meat is “annoying and baffling the local community”, and that residents are starting to worry about the potential reasons behind the bizarre behaviour.

She said: “People are really worried about it, about whether there’s any poison in it and if it’s intended for dogs who might get sick if they eat it. It could be lots of people doing it for all sorts of different reasons. I put a call out on various social media groups a couple of weeks ago and have had a flurry of information from various members of the public which I have passed to the community support police offers at Reddish police station.

“It’s a very strange phenomenon and one which the community are finding very distressing and baffling but I’m not sure there’s a lot that the police or council can do until somebody is caught in the act.”

The meat is left in large portions and often looks neatly prepared and cut, Ms Williams added, with the suggestion that it may be being dumped by someone with professional experience in butchering or catering, but this has not been proven.

Ms Williams said: “My opinion, if I’m honest, is that it’s businesses cutting costs on legitimate disposal practices during the cost of living crises and they may be unaware that what they doing is essentially fly tipping even though the product might be seen as biodegradable.”

Bags of it have been collected by local residents as part of the clean up, sometimes weighing as much as 20kg. Reports of meat being dumped have appeared in other parts of the country too, with Slough Borough Council sharing that a man was convicted for it in December 2022 after being caught on CCTV.

Stockport council said it is aware of the problem, and has arranged for the discarded meat to be cleaned up when reported.

Councillor Frankie Singleton, Stockport’s cabinet member for communities, culture and sport, said the council is monitoring the situation along with the Department for Environment Food and Rural Affairs, and Natural England. She added: “We have received no reports since before Christmas and have not heard of any dogs or other wildlife falling ill.”

Greater Manchester Police was contacted for comment.