Dorset Partnership at risk of further overspend

This comes after the Partnership put in place a 37-point plan to address a £2.8 million overspend in its 2014/15 budget, caused by problems encountered during the rollout of the ‘Recycle for Dorset’ joint collection system (see letsrecycle.com story).

White Young Green director Nigel Mattravers has now taken over as interim director of the Partnership, following the suspension of the Partnership’s director Steve Burdis, who had overseen the rollout of the new service (see letsrecycle.com story).

Financial documents published ahead of a meeting of the Partnership’s joint committee next week (June 15) reveal that the budget agreed by the DWP in January of £32.45 million is now likely to be exceeded by £911,000.

Reasons for the projected overspend occurring include the loss of income for recyclable material – which now costs the Partnership £28 per tonne to dispose of, having cost around £10 per tonne when the budget was originally set. And, the Partnership anticipates that, unless market conditions improve, an extra spend of up to £390,000 for the year is likely to be necessary.

Garden waste

A fall in the number of users for the Partnership’s garden waste collection service – for which householders pay a £41 subscription per year – has also been cited as a potential lossmaking area.

Dorset’s garden waste collection service attracted around 29,000 users in 2014/15, with subscriptions contributing around £128,000 towards overheads. However, around 3,000 households have decided not to renew their subscription for the service, which it is expected will cost the Partnership around £200,000 in lost income and consequent costs involved in discontinuing collections.

It is also anticipated that the Partnership will realise smaller savings than had been expected when the budget was originally set, with an under achievement of around £250,000. Councillors will be asked to approve plans to adopt charges for using some services at Household Waste Recycling Centres (HWRCs) in a bid to find additional savings.

Savings

Further savings are being investigated by the DWP including reorganisation of collection rounds in some areas and optimising bin stocks

In his report noting the progress already made to seek savings, Mr Mattravers writes: “The action plan for the Dorset Waste Partnership was approved by the Joint Committee at the March 2015 meeting. Of the 37 items listed, 22 are considered to be complete; although many of these actions are on-going and have become business as usual. All other items are in progress and only two of these are not expected to be complete by the date for implementation originally identified.”

The areas where the Partnership is expected to miss its target dates for implementation are noted as vehicle information and route optimisation.

Formed in April 2011, the councils involved in the Partnership include: Christchurch borough; Dorset county, East Dorset district; North Dorset district; Purbeck district; West Dorset district, and Weymouth and Portland borough.

The roll out of the joint ‘Recycle for Dorset’ service began in October 2012 – but hit a snag in autumn 2014 following a delay in providing bins for around 50,000 residents in the Weymouth and Portland area.

DWP then forecast that it would require £2.3 million in excess of its budget to continue the roll out, which subsequently rose to an estimated £2.8 million due to unbudgeted costs – including a further £300,000 on hire vehicles.