Cigarette butt bylaw scrapped by Wellington City Council

Some people don't see dropping cigarette butts as littering, councillor Andy Foster said. Photo / File

A pointless bylaw targeting people who drop cigarette butts was not all for nothing, councillors say.

The Wellington City Council voted last year for a bylaw making it an offence to throw away cigarette butts instead of properly disposing of them, despite knowing it would not enforce it.

But the dropping of butts was already covered in the Litter Act, making the bylaw unnecessary.

City Strategy Committee members today voted to scrap the clause altogether, but councillor Brian Dawson maintained the short-lived bylaw had at least highlighted the issue and reminded people that dropping butts is still littering.

"I still believe personally that there is absolutely no point of having a bylaw, a rule, or regulation that we have no intention of enforcing," he said in a meeting this morning.

But Dawson said the Litter Act was not widely recognised, and "increasingly fewer people are paying any attention to it whatsoever".

Media coverage around the cigarette butt bylaw, referred to by some as Buttgate, had done well to educate people on the issue, he said.

"There is a significant minority of people who simply believe that the world is theirs to do with what they please, so they will discard their rubbish wherever they will.

"It's not the council's responsiblity to clean up people's rooms, or indeed to clean up after them. People need to be, as we say in this country, 'tidy Kiwis'."

Dawson said Wellington had the lowest rate of smoking in the country, below 9 per cent, and the best way to reduce cigarette butt litter was to reduce the amount of people smoking.

Councillor Andy Foster also said the bylaw had helped to highlight the issue.

"A lot of people don't actually see cigarette butts as litter," he said. "I think it's really, really useful we've got that out there."

Councillor Nicola Young pointed out discarded chewing gum on streets and footpaths was also an issue, and that she would like to see "a crack down on chewing gum manufacturers".