Defra: target cap will not hit national recycling efforts

The decision to limit council household waste recycling targets to 30% in 2005/06 was announced last week and affects 103 councils.

The move has been met with a mixed reaction from the recycling sector, with some believing it will slow down the country's overall recycling performance and the Community Recycling Network calling the decision “absurd”.

” The cap of 30% gives these high performing local authorities more flexibility to decide how and when to intensify recycling effort without putting pressure on Council Tax. “
– Defra statement
In a statement issued to letsrecycle.com this week, Defra insisted: “Differential rates of increase in waste arisings between local authorities enable reduction in pressure on the highest performers (who are already proportionately delivering the most, compensating for poorer performance elsewhere) without compromising delivery of the 25% national recycling target for 2005/06.”

The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs has previously said that meeting the national 25% household waste recycling target would be challenging.

Time
Further justifying the decision, Defra said it recognised that while many authorities have been able to deliver and sustain very high levels of recycling, in some circumstances authorities may have been unable to deliver this degree of step change in the time available, or could only do so at disproportionate short-term cost

It said: “The cap of 30% therefore gives these high performing local authorities more flexibility to decide how and when to intensify recycling effort without putting pressure on Council Tax.”

Defra added that the target cap was not a bar on recycling more than 30% of waste, and that the government would commend authorities who continued to drive towards higher recycling rates.

” We hope that everyone will stay focused on the bigger picture. “
– Andy Moore, CRN UK
“Government continues to expect local authorities to work towards more sustainable waste management – to deliver tough landfill diversion targets under the Landfill Directive and contribute to achievement of national recycling targets,” Defra said.

Absurd
The Community Recycling Network has warned that the decision to reduce council recycling targets – and this week's decision to reduce Landfill Allowance Trading Scheme fines form 200 a tonne to 150 a tonne – was “giving out the wrong signal”.

The Network, which represents more than 300 community recycling groups, said: “The CRN feels it is absurd that policies are being introduced that encourage local authorities to be less ambitious.”

Andy Moore, co-ordinator of CRN UK, said there was no room to relax in terms of recycling targets. “We hope this is not an indicator that political will is faltering,” he said.

“We hope that everyone will stay focused on the bigger picture. Certainly our members will continue to work with their local authority partners towards the diversion rates we know are achievable,” Mr Moore added.