Furious man threatened with £100 fine and police action for feeding bread to birds in Milton Keynes

A city dad is livid after he says he was threatened with a £100 littering fine and police action for feeding bread to birds.

He has hit out at the city’s litter warden system and accused it of being over-zealous and “crazy”.

And he claimed the litter wardens, who are contracted by the council to keep MK tidy, followed him and his partner for 40 minutes over three miles when they refused to give them their details.

The incident happened yesterday (Monday) near Tesco in the car park at Kingston retail centre, where hungry little birds can often be seen hopping around between parked cars looking for scraps of food.

The shopper, who is 40, says he and his partner had bought some bread and decided to feed some to the birds. They were throwing tiny bits of bread to them when the litter wardens suddenly intervened.

"They told us we need to pay a £100 fine and a £1,000 fine if we didn’t give them our details… It was crazy. I refused to give my details as I've not committed a crime and I videoed them on my phone,” he said.

MK City Council says the warden approached because they saw him throwing a cigarette butt on the ground. However, the man strongly disputes this and has video evidence, seen by the MK Citizen, of the wardens saying the fine was for throwing bread to the birds.

"They were talking about how feeding birds was bad for the environment and it could bloat the birds. They wouldn’t stop… We just kept walking for 40 minutes while they followed us. My partner had blisters and she was really scared we’d be arrested.”

The man has now requested the warden’s bodycam footage. “I want to have a meeting where they show me their footage and I show them mine,” he said.

"They were accusing us of committing a crime and said they’d called the police and had given the police our description… My partner was getting really anxious. That’s why I started videoing them.”

The man is now contemplating putting his video on YouTube.

A spokesperson for MK City Council told the Citizen today: “This attempted fine (formally called a Fixed Penalty Notice) was for dropping cigarette butts, not for feeding birds.”

But they added: “We do urge people not to feed birds in public spaces, especially with bread as it attracts rodents and pests, undoing our work to tackle pests. The wardens raised this with the resident, but this advice did not relate to the attempted Fixed Penalty Notice.

“It is an offence to fail to provide details when requested for a FPN, and in some rare instances we may involve the police. With this in mind, wardens can use their judgement on whether to spend a few minutes checking if an offender is returning to a car or home.”

The man is still angry though and has concerns other people may be targeted in the same way.

“Feeding the birds is not a crime… I was shocked,” he said.

“Other people, especially vulnerable people, would have been very intimidated by this.”