Speaking to letsrecycle.com in the wake of last month’s vote at WRAP to seek charity status for the organisation, chief executive Dr Liz Goodwin said on recycling levels: “Having built up some momentum it’s dreadful to see it slowing down.”
Dr Goodwin also spoke of her excitement of the organisation’s move to try and secure charity status in 2015 which would bring an expanded role and income stream.
On the target of 50% recycling by 2020 for the UK, she explained: “A lot of drivers for higher recycling targets have gone. If local authorities don’t have targets then they’re bound to think about how they use their money in a different way.”
But, she dismissed the notion that any of the slump in recycling progress was down to the performance of WRAP itself. Asked if a reduction in its own budgets and activities was a factor, she said: “No I don’t think so, we are doing all we can to support local authorities in what they are trying to do.”
But, Dr Goodwin conceded that “not all authorities have engaged with WRAP” and urged more to do so. “I worry that local authorities are feeling a bit beleaguered and it seems unfair. They have dwindling resources and then me or Dan Rogerson coming along saying ‘you’ve got to carry on and have to reach 50%’.”
Local authorities
Dr Goodwin assured local authorities that WRAP would do anything it could to help them “if they want to work with us.” However, in terms of local authority involvement, she described the situation as “a bit of a mix. There are ones we are always engaged with and some we have not had very much engagement with.”
Recent personal experiences in Oxfordshire have been highlighted by Dr Goodwin. She has written of being disappointed that householders were failing to put out their recycling bins for collection. Reflecting on the situation in the county, where she lives, she declared: “I am shocked, but then I worry about these things and I care about this. It’s also a fact that Oxfordshire is good, if we can’t sort it out in Oxfordshire, then it is going to be much worse in areas where it is harder to recycle.”
Stressing the benefits of partnership working, Dr Goodwin that it was a shame that the Oxford Waste Partnership had come to an end. “Local authorities do get benefits from working together.”
And, she also expressed shock that a survey by WRAP had found “that only 25% of us are putting the right things in the bin, the reason for that is the communication.”
Reassuring local authorities of WRAP’s support, Dr Goodwin said: “For the foreseeable future, it will continue to be quite an important part of our work, because we have the challenge of the 50% recycling rates, that’s going right up to 2020. We are trying to make sure we hit those recycling rates, which I have already gone out and said I am concerned about, I think local authorities have to be an important part of our work.”
In terms of workload, she said more of WRAP’s activities were this year being focused on the local authority sector than last.
Asked if it was more than half the organisation’s workload, she replied: “The way I sort of group things together, is what we are doing on food, food waste collections, that’s some bits of local authority work, and the same with textiles and electricals. Then there is resource management and end markets. It is a substantial part, one of our major parts, probably less than half and will probably continue to be less than half. We are putting more into it this year than last year which is interesting considering we have had a budget cut.”
Infrastructure
To get to the 50% level, Dr Goodwin said that more infrastructure will be needed. “We need everybody to have a food waste collections, everybody to collect the regular materials and more participation. We need 1.7 m tonnes more, our analysis shows it needs to be pretty much all those materials. We also certainly need communications.”
She touched too on council finances saying it was “very difficult. That’s where we have to look at the value of materials, and ensure the value is being recognised. The whole thing should be financially sustainable.” However, asked if she felt contractors were ‘ripping off councils’ she said: “I am certainly not saying that. I don’t think councils see the benefit sufficiently, it may be the money doesn’t come back into waste.”
In terms of new strategies or targets for local authorities, the WRAP chief indicated that she felt little was likely to happen until after the next General Election. While WRAP was currently taking on board feedback from Defra for its work on local authority collections, she suggested that a new Waste Strategy was an option for an incoming government next year. But, she revealed that WRAP is involved with Defra in shaping policy at the moment.
Asked if enough was being done to get recycling rates to increase, she said: “Well that’s what we are doing at the moment to work with Defra to try and develop a plan to get from where we are now until 2020. We are working with Defra, it’s a joint thing about what can we as WRAP do to help. But we are not the only players, there is a role for the waste management companies and there is a role for local authorities. There is a need for concerted effort from a lot of people.”
Charity status
Some observers in the waste and recycling sector may well have been surprised that WRAP has survived what some newspapers have called “the bonfire of the quangos”.
WRAP, of course is not a quango, and Dr Goodwin smiled over whether or not a move to charity status would mean she could could ‘park’ the term. “I don’t know whether it will ever be parked. I suspect we will still be referred to as a quango. No we are not a quango, I just have to try and ignore it when I see it!”
The focus now is on gaining charity status which is also meaning a more inward focus, with WRAP building and keeping a team of expert staff, rather than ” rather than actually helping other organisations outside to develop their skills.”
The chief executive said that “this is an exciting time for WRAP, it feels that we are at a bit of a crossroads.”
The organisation will have the benefit of significant government funding support going forward. She puts this down to “building relationships. Ever since I have became chief exec, I have put relationships as being very important and partnerships, and trying to built what felt like a partnership between ourselves and the government and then you can work together to understand priorities and issues and work through the problems as well.”
Now it is “about the technical skills and expertise, I want to make we retain the skills and expertise. It’s particularly important when, you can see that Defra has gone through a lot of change and they may need more of our skills and expertise so it’s important that we retain that. And likewise for the other governments.”
Dr Goodwin said she wasn’t sure why WRAP set up as a charity at the very beginning but that it followed a limited by guarantee company model set up by Philip Ward in Defra.
“Our decision to look for charitable status is driven by a number of things. It is part of thinking about ourselves as an organisation and where we want to go and diversify our funding. If we become a charity I think it will open up other opportunities for us in terms of funding but it also will allow us to work in different ways and develop different sorts of partnerships which I think might have been less easy with our old structure. It’s also easier for people to get their heads round.
“If you ask me the question what is WRAP, and I give you the answer we are a charity that promotes resource efficiency that’s much easier than the sort of three paragraph answer that we are a private sector company limited by guarantee.”
Income
WRAP’s horizons are also set to broaden as are their income streams. The chief executive says WRAP has “had lots of approaches from other countries, there is a lot of interest in WRAP as an organisation, certainly some of them are thinking they could set up something similar. It is about our work, particularly food waste, we are known around the world for knowing about food waste and reducing food waste. I think that’s something the UK and not just WRAP can be proud of.”
And, Dr Godwin is convinced WRAP can make a difference on the global stage. “We can make a difference on the global stage. The thing that gets me out of bed in the morning is that we have made a difference in the UK, and it would be a waste if we didn’t try to maximise that impact.”
This will also mean there is potential for new funding streams such as from charitable trusts with similar aims.
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