Graffiti

Graffiti is an illegal, anti-social activity.

The Council and Hampshire Constabulary are working together to reduce instances of graffiti. Understanding where, and how often, graffiti writing is happening is essential to building up the intelligence for this form of criminal damage and you can play a key role. 

Please support us and the Police by reporting all instances of graffiti. You can help by telling us: 

• the time and date that you first saw the graffiti;  
• where it is; and, 
• by sharing a photo of it (you will need to log into your My Eastleigh to do this). 

If you have any information about who is responsible, please let us know. 

We deal with requests for graffiti removal from Council owned property, with the highest priority given to removing offensive material.

We aim to:

• clear offensive graffiti from all council owned property within one working day of it being reported.
• clear non-offensive graffiti from all council owned property within five working days of it being reported.

If the graffiti is on private property, the Council cannot remove it without permission from the landowner. When this is reported to us, we will try to contact the landowner to get permission.   

It is important that instances of graffiti is reported to the Police. You can report this online via: https://www.hampshire.police.uk/ro/report/ocr/af/how-to-report-a-crime/. Reporting graffiti writing helps the Police understand the scale of the problem and to plan their response in association with other types of anti-social behavior.   

Anyone caught graffiti writing may be prosecuted under the Criminal Damage Act 1971. If the value of criminal damage exceeds £5,000 the maximum penalty for those aged 18 or over is ten years imprisonment. For those aged 12-17 years the maximum custodial penalty is a detention and training order of up to 24 months.

Where the damage is less than £5,000 the maximum sentence is three months imprisonment or a fine of £2,500 for adult offenders.

Vandalism
We have a responsibility to repair damage or vandalism to publicly owned land or buildings.