Graffiti is criminal damage under the Criminal Damage Act 1971. There are no legal sites for graffiti within the Royal Borough. Those caught in the act of graffiti or with intent to undertake graffiti within the Borough will be prosecuted.

If the value of criminal damage exceeds £5,000 the maximum penalty for those aged 18 or over is ten years imprisonment and 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.

An alternative sanction for minor graffiti offences is the issue of a penalty notice. Under the Anti-social Behavior Act 2003 Police Community Support Officers and those persons accredited under the community safety scheme are allowed to issue penalty notices of £50.

Schemes like the recent Home Office ‘Name That Tag’ offer a reward for information on prolific graffiti writers.

See www.homeoffice.gov.uk.

The British Transport Police also run an information sharing database of tags which can be accessed by Local Authorities. This database enables the full extent of the damage caused by graffiti to be collated and taken into account by the court in sentencing.

Section 48 of the Anti-social Behaviour Act 2003 gives local authorities the power to serve graffiti removal notices on certain bodies responsible for the surface where graffiti has appeared. These bodies include the owners of street furniture (bus shelters, street signs, phone boxes etc). The notice gives a minimum of 28 days for the removal of the graffiti, if after that time it has not been removed the local authority can remove it and can recover its costs.

Taken from: http://www.rbkc.gov.uk/planning/general/graffiti_flyposting_law.asp