The Merseyside Waste Disposal Authority has announced plans to trial a pay-for trade waste disposal service at its Bidston household waste and recycling centre in a bid to increase revenue from its civic amenity sites.
The statutory body, which represents Sefton, St. Helens, Knowsley, Liverpool and The Wirral, has previously sought to clamp down on trade waste abuse at its HWRCs by introducing a permitting scheme for all vans entering its recycling sites (see letsrecycle.com story).
However, under this trial measure, traders would be charged per load to recycle material at the Bidston household waste and recycling centre (HWRC) on The Wirral and it is intended to act as a low-cost alternative for local businesses compared to landfill.
The announcement by the body, known as the MWDA, comes hot-on-the-heels of the government announcing in its Waste Review that business waste being accepted and charged for at HWRCs could be used by councils to help keep sites open (see letsrecycle.com story).
Commenting on the trial scheme, MWDA chief executive Carl Beer said: Traders win because they will pay less to get rid of their waste than if they simply took it to landfill. Everyone else wins because we will be able to make sure as much of the waste as possible gets recycled so there is less pressure on the environment.
The service is set to run for six months and is being administered by the Authoritys waste contractor Veolia Environmental Services.
GMWDA
The announcement by the MWDA comes after the Greater Manchester Waste Disposal Authority (GMWDA) last week (June 17) confirmed that it will close four of its 25 HWRCs and combine two sites into a single super site at a new location in Bolton.
It was agreed at last weeks annual general meeting that the sites, which were first identified in March 2011 (see letsrecycle.com story), would be closed.
Councillor Neil Swannick, chair of the GMWDA, said: The Authority does not want to close any sites, but unfortunately financial savings of this significance could not be achieved in other areas without affecting the level of service provided to council tax payers across Greater Manchester.
The GMWDA said that if the six sites, which are now set to close, were kept open then it would miss its targeted financial savings for the year.
Warwickshire
National Civic Amenity Site Conference
Issues such as trade waste and reduced hours are set to be discussed at the first National Civic Amenity Site Conference, which is being held on July 5 at the National Motorcycle Museum in Solihull. For more information click here.
Meanwhile, Warwickshire county council has vowed to keep eight of its nine HWRCs open seven-days-a-week following an extensive review of its service provision. The remaining sites will continue to be run by the Warwickshire county council but will be open for six hours on weekdays rather than eight.
And, under the councils plans, the HWRCs at Stockton and Wellesbourne will be run by community organisations. The community organisation charged with operating the sites will be named in the coming weeks.
Councillor Alan Cockburn, chair of the Warwickshire Waste Partnership, said the involvement of the voluntary sector would be the first of such schemes in the country and said that the community sector involvement was key in helping ensure that the majority of sites could remain open.
Cllr Cockburn said: To enable the best possible service provision within the budget savings that had to be made, a lot of work has been going on behind the scenes to find new and innovative ways to deliver our Household Waste Recycling Centre service.
A final decision has now been made into the delivery of the service, utilising the private sector, the voluntary sector and Warwickshire county council direct services. We are particularly excited about delivering the governments Big Society vision by welcoming the voluntary sector to help run two of our sites in the community.
The review of HWRCs was initiated after the council was required to find 800,000 saving by 2012 to cover all nine recycling sites and the disposal of green waste and recycling that comes from them.
In addition, the county council must make a further 143,500 saving through an open bag policy which will be introduced on site to reduce non-recyclable waste.
A four-week public consultation on the proposed changes to opening hours and site policies will be launched at the end of this month.
HWRCs
Concerns around the provision of household waste and recycling centres (HWRCs) emerged in December 2010, with the service appearing to be the most vulnerable to cuts and closures in the wake of the Comprehensive Spending Review (see letsrecycle.com story).
And, the issue of HWRCs has remained prominent with the Somerset Waste Partnership this week revealing that its much-publicised charging scheme, which was introduced at four of its 18 sites in April 2011, has led to a significant increase in fly-tipping (see letsrecycle.com story).
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