Sorry, but this is just being shifty and irresponsible. And how are they using littering as a business model? The bloody twats who are picking these up without paying and dumping them in a creek are the ones littering - it's like blaming the shopping centre for you stealing, because they had stuff for you to steal.
Look at the mess Aussies have made with shopping trolleys from Coles/Woolworths. The supermarkets got so fed up they implemented locks on the wheels - nearly every supermarket here does this now.
The only reason the bikes are worse is because they're lighter/easier to move than trolleys, and the locks aren't as hard to overcome as for trolleys.
That, and Australia is in general very un-bike friendly. It's a cultural thing - we love our V6/V8 engines, our big SUVs, and our giant McMansions - we essentially copy the US in those traits. You compare this to say, Europe, or Japan which tend to be much more bike friendly.
