The Local Authority Recycling Advisory Committee has said that councils are “effectively being forced to register their CA sites as Designated Collection Facilities (DCFs) by retailers so that they can claim an adequate collection network has been set up”.
– Lee Marshall, LARAC
The comments come as the retailers – overseen by the British Retail Consortium – are attempting to carry out their obligations under forthcoming producer responsibility legislation stemming from the EU WEEE Directive (see letsrecycle.com story).
Although the BRC is offering funds up to 6,000 for local authorities to upgrade their CA sites to collect WEEE on behalf of retailers, LARAC said today that a number of local authorities are still refusing to register their CA sites. The councils want firmer details regarding the standards required and a suitable level of funding to be established before agreeing to register.
Lee Marshall, chair of LARAC, accepted that council CA sites represent the “most effective method of collecting WEEE in the UK”, but warned that some sites would not be as suitable for upgrades.
Spirit
Mr Marshall said: “Saying that we should 'sign up or else' is neither in the spirit of the Directive nor partnership working and once again we have a producer responsibility being sidestepped at the taxpayers expense to conserve profits.
“Whilst it has been stated that around 6,000 is available to upgrade CA sites so they can become collection points, this is a considerable reduction to that which it was initially agreed was needed to upgrade CA sites to a suitable standard,” Mr Marshall added.
LARAC also raised the concern that sites not signing up to attain DCF status would not have any access to producer collections of WEEE. The Committee said that if this was the case, it would be likely that such sites would stop accepting WEEE altogether.
“That would only reduce services to the public and work against maximising recycling,” LARAC warned.
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LARAC has now written to Defra suggesting a way forward and is also offering new options to retailers and producers.
These proposals suggest that no site would be refused registration as a DCF, that sites could sign up at any time to be DCFs, but that when signing up would commit for a certain period. For sites signed up as DCFs, retailers and producers would be in control of the specification of the sites, effectively controlling the costs involved.
Letsrecycle.com is holding a special conference on the way forward for waste electronics on October 12. For more details see the letsrecycle.com events page
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