Electrolink reassures councils over WEEE at civic amenity sites

On Friday (see letsrecycle.com story) the verdict was given in an action brought by the REPIC scheme against the government and the Environment Agency. The judge found in favour of the Department for Business and the Agency.

Some of the discussions centred around the issue of whether schemes which had access to more WEEE at civic amenity sites than for their own immediate obligations were acting fairly.

Now, reacting to the case, the Electrolink scheme has highlighted its stance on the court case. It had argued that “local authorities must be free to select the compliance scheme of their choice to partner their DCF contractors and must not be bound by an allocation system to accept whichever scheme the system appoints for them.”

Barry Van Danzig for Electrolink said: “This is a great and justifiable victory for the government in this review. The Regulations stand as they must and we the schemes, including REPIC, have to obey them in line with the directions of the Regulators. Those directions are very clear and under collectors have to either reduce their obligation or appoint over collectors to collect WEEE on their behalf.

“The real beneficiary is however the environment and the Local Authority, as the LA can select the scheme that will work in the best interests of the environment rather than simply trying to comply with the Regulations at the lowest possible cost to producers regardless of how that affects the Local Authority or their DCF contractor.”

Mr Van Danzig explained to letsrecycle.com that going forward he would expect compliance schemes to have to show they have a viable plan to obtain sufficient evidence to cover their membership. Accordingly, schemes with a big obligation would have to sign contracts with schemes who had access to more tonnage than they needed.

He added that he felt the time had come to end disagreement over the system and asked whether REPIC agree “with us that the time has come for this conflict to end and for us both to sit down and agree a long term working relationship that benefits all stakeholders in the recycling of WEEE, especially the environment in which we all live and work”.

Electrolink, said Mr Van Danzig, are in discussions with all under-collecting PCSs and expect to conclude agreements with most – if not everyone – in August ready for the 2010 Scheme application deadline.

Scotland

Electrolink is registered in Scotland and so it is expected that the findings of the High Court case will be adopted north of the border and to Electrolink, although this process has yet to be confirmed.

Now it is expected that the Environment Agency and the Department for Business will assess the judgement before moving forward. The issue of over-collecting of WEEE, such as is likely with Electrolink, could also come under discussion. However, there would appear to be some pressure now on REPIC as a larger compliance scheme to agree more contracts to secure evidence.

A relevant paragraph in the ruling is as follows (the claimant is REPIC and the defendants were BERR and the Environment Agency):

“When the whole of paragraph 4 is looked at against the background of the Regulations as a whole and the WEEE Directive I have reached the clear conclusion that the use of the word “equivalent” within paragraph 4 is consistent only with the interpretation of the paragraph put forward by the Claimant, the Defendants and the First Interested Party. In my judgment, the use of the word is intended to ensure that a producer compliance scheme has viable plans to collect no more and no less than is necessary to meet its obligation under Regulation 22. If it does not have viable plans to collect a sufficient amount of WEEE a breach of paragraph 4 will be established. If its plans for collection envisage over-collection there will be a breach of paragraph 4.”

Judge Wyn Williams then went on to say: “It seems to me to be necessary to stress, however, that paragraph 4 is designed to ensure that a producer compliance scheme has viable plans. What is the position if viable plans exist and the producer compliance scheme acts in accordance with those plans in relation to the collection of WEEE yet, nonetheless, the scheme either under-collects or over-collects as a matter of fact? In those circumstances, it seems to me that there would be no breach of paragraph 4.

“The obligation of the producer compliance scheme is to have viable plans. That does not mean, of course, that the producer compliance scheme can produce viable plans to collect an equivalent amount of WEEE to that for which it is financially responsible but then ignore those plans and collect more (or less) than the plans specify when there is no need to do so in order to comply with its obligations under the Regulations.

“If, however, viable plans exist for the collection of an equivalent amount of WEEE and they are implemented it does not seem to me that an actual over-collection or under-collection of WEEE which had come about only because of the difficulty in predicting the precise amount of WEEE which was necessary to comply with obligations under the Regulations would amount to a breach of paragraph 4.”