In their responses to the waste strategy review the Chartered Institution of Wastes Management, the Local Government Association and London Remade have all said that targets for business waste and more council involvement would be a good thing.
”Integrated strategies, plans and infrastructure to manage industrial and commercial wastes are consistent features of EU member states with good performance in wastes management “
– Steve Lee, CIWM
But government came in for criticism from CIWM, who believe it is a sad indictment that there is not already the date, information or systems in place to already be discussing the possibility of commercial and household waste being brought closer.
Also in the responses to the strategy there were calls for government to work on offering PFI funding at a smaller level, a strong push for variable charging and fears that the waste hierarchy may not be workable for households.
Involvement
In its response to the strategy the LGA was strongly in favour of local authorities becoming more involved in collecting waste from businesses.
Alice Roberts, LGA's executive manager for waste and environment, said: “To ensure businesses have the recycling services they need, either councils need a power to set a minimum level of recycling service for local businesses for local operators to comply with or obligations need to be placed on the waste industry to provide recycling services to businesses.”
And its view was shared by the CIWM which pointed out that pulling the two together has worked elsewhere in Europe.
Steve Lee, chief executive officer at CIWM, said: “Integrated strategies, plans and infrastructure to manage industrial and commercial wastes are consistent features of EU member states with good performance in wastes management.
CIWM can see clear benefits in authorities having facilitation and advisory roles in conjunction with the private sector but must have the resources needed to develop and maintain the service,” he added.
Questions
In its response the Institute questioned whether the waste hierarchy could be followed when dealing with householders. It said that there remain questions about how individual householders can involve themselves in waste prevention. “Is it realistic to expect householders to reduce their packaging by de-packaging items before leaving the shop?” it asked.
” We would recommend the establishment of clear and potentially mandatory data sets covering all waste arisings as a matter of some urgency “
– Daniel Silverstone, London Remade
CIWM believes that a better option maybe to provide recycling opportunities for the householder rather than educate them on waste minimisation, despite what is said in the waste hierarchy.
This view has been shared by the Environmental Services Association, which added: “Whilst recognising that the waste hierarchy should continue to underpin the sustainable management of society's waste, we caution against hoping that waste prevention can result in major shifts in behaviour and waste production in the short or medium term.”
Variable charging
With regards to householders, the LGA once again used the strategy as an opportunity to push forward its view that variable charging should be introduced. Ms Roberts added that the government should begin now looking at the technicalities of introducing the system.
In its response, London Remade has said that there needs to be more concentration on investment in medium term projects below the established PFI threshold. The organisation said that the 5 million – 20 million range needed further investigation.
It also claimed that there is a deficiency in the review on proposals for further developing markets for recycled content products. And it called for more reliable data covering the volumes, types and values of the totality of waste streams.
Daniel Silverstone, chief executive of London Remade, said: “We would recommend the establishment of clear and potentially mandatory data sets covering all waste arisings as a matter of some urgency.”
Elsewhere the Furniture Re-use Network called for clarification that re-use actually exists at two levels of the waste hierarchy
It stated: “The Reuse activity can be carried out on products which have entered the waste stream and in products that are sent directly for second-use and are therefore not waste,.
Due to the nature of this hierarchal cross-cutting activity, the activity and definition of re-use has been misplaced and misunderstood. We suggest that re-use requires classification and a position within the waste hierarchy.”
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