COUNCIL officers are to disregard the law to speed up cleaning graffiti from private buildings.

From Monday, the council's envirocrime team will remove the anti-social scrawl without waiting for owners' permission, to bypass "pointless bureaucracy".

They have been told by the council's cabinet to forget about following the letter of the law because that can cause delays of up to six weeks.

The mess will now be scrubbed off as soon as one of the council's envirocrime team sees it.

Councillor Will Brooks, cabinet member for the environment and transport, said: "Graffiti is disgusting and even a little bit can ruin the look of our neighbourhoods.

"What we have done here is waive the disclaimer process for a trial period in a bid to get the borough looking cleaner much faster.

"Some might say we are taking a risk by not following the rules to the letter of the law.

"We have not got time to sit in our offices filling in forms and waiting for some property owners to ponder whether they want graffiti removed or not.

"The council and residents want immediate action and that's what we are going to do."

Before, the envirocrime team had to get owners to sign disclaimers .

If disclaimers were not signed, the team would face a wait for all the legal processes to be completed before they could remove the graffiti without the owner's consent.

The suspension will initially last for four months.

The council recently doubled the number of graffiti teams from three to six to help it reach the target of removing graffiti from publicly owned property within 24 hours from the time it is reported.

To report graffiti, call 020 8825 6000.

bmbridger@london.newsquest.co.uk