Councils need to justify collections, says Defra

Councils are set to come under increased pressure to justify their choice of kerbside collection scheme and make clearer what it is costing householders, Defra has claimed.

 

The cost of how much recycling and residual collections actually cost householders and the taxpayer needs to be made clear

 
Diana Linskey, deputy head of waste, Defra 

Speaking at a Value For Money in Waste Management conference in London last Thursday (December 9), Diana Linskey, deputy head of waste at the department, said that it was looking to work with councils to enable them to show that residents were both satisfied and well-served by kerbside recycling and refuse schemes.

Ms Linskey said that as part of the forthcoming Localism Bill, which is due to be published later today (December 13), ministers would seek assurance that service provisions were value-for-money and reflected the needs of the residents they served.

“We will probably have to do more for councils to show evidence of residents' satisfaction and how they have responded to residents who are not best pleased with the service that that local authority has chosen to roll out,” she said.

Ms Linskey added: “The cost of how much recycling and residual collections actually cost householders and the taxpayer needs to be made clear to them and that is an area I think is important. Those in local government need to make it clear there is value-for-money.”

In her address, Ms Linskey also gave an overview of Defra's work to date, including a brief outline of the ongoing Waste Policy Review, and how October's Comprehensive Spending Review had impacted the work of the department.

“I know that the settlement was not very good and was perhaps more painful for local government than they had hoped it would be,” she said. “We do recognise that local government have had a very significant and difficult increase, as has this department.”

Outlining future work, Ms Linskey said that Defra would be working to ensure that councils were well placed to address the “challenging change” caused by the budgetary constraints. And, she said this would involve “thinking hard” about balancing environmental impacts, service provision and costs.

Communications

Also speaking at the event, Dr Adam Read, waste management specialist at consultancy AEA Environmental, said that there had been an immediate response among councils to cut communications budgets in the wake of the CSR announcement. However, he warned that this was not necessarily a wise move.

He said: “We have asked councils if they are going to reduce communications, and the evidence I am getting is ‘yes'. It is seen as the easiest programme to cut but I would suggest that you don't because how will you communicate those new service changes or new plants and expect them to work soundly from day one?”

Furthermore, Mr Read said he was “seriously worried” about the impact of the impending Localism Bill.

He claimed that the legislation could potentially further hamper waste infrastructure development by devolving decisions making powers further. “How long is it going to take for people to make a decision about red box or a black box,” he said.

“Can people be expected to make the value judgements around issues such as separate collections or commingled collections, the need for energy-from-waste, a more expensive system that hits high targets against a cheaper one that doesn't perform as well? I, for one, don't think people are ready to take into account issues such as carbon metrics.”