Defra affirms support for recycling incentives

Defra has confirmed that it is still favouring rewarding residents to recycle and will be assessing options for encouraging incentive-based schemes as part of the forthcoming Waste Review.

Both in government and in opposition, the Conservative Party has been a strong proponent of incentive-based schemes, particularly the American rewards-based scheme RecycleBank, which George Osborne first name-checked in July 2008.

But, despite continued vocal support for the scheme from ministers in recent years, the uptake of the incentive-based systems appears to have stalled in recent years with councils citing concerns over the introduction costs as a major stumbling block (see (see letsrecycle.com story).

However, responding to a written question in the House of Commons yesterday (April 27), Defra minister Richard Benyon affirmed the governments support for incentive schemes to encourage recycling but said it was for councils to choose the appropriate system.

In raising the question, Conservative MP and noted environmentalist Zac Goldsmith, asked specifically what plans the government had for the national roll-out of the American rewards-based scheme RecycleBank.

Responding to Mr Goldsmith, Mr Benyon said: This government believes in rewards, rather than penalties, to encourage recycling and other beneficial behaviours. As part of the Waste Policy Review we are looking at how we can support councils to reward householders for recycling.

A number of local authorities have entered into contracts with RecycleBank to provide rewards for recycling, and we support them taking this initiative. It is for individual local authorities to decide whether a reward scheme is appropriate in their area and what type it should be.

Recycling rewards have emerged as a favoured method of encouraging recycling, with it anticipated that environment secretary Caroline Spelman will use the Waste Review to scrap powers allowing councils to penalise residents who recycle incorrectly or place bins out on the wrong day (see letsrecycle.com story).

Uptake

To date, the RecycleBank scheme has been adopted by the Royal borough of Windsor and Maidenhead and Halton borough council. And, while a handful of local authorities have mooted introducing the scheme, no concrete plans have been announced.

One source, close to the RecycleBank project, told letsrecycle.com that, along with costs, concerns around the procurement process for the RecycleBank scheme in particular had hindered councils from adopting the incentive scheme.

He said: The European procurement rules mean local authorities, in some cases, believe that they have to go through a legal, formal tender process, which is expensive and when a number of local authorities are short staffed then they are not going to be looking at going down that route. That is a problem and I think that some local authorities dont understand [the RecycleBank system].

The full roll-out of the RecycleBank scheme in Windsor and Maidenhead in July 2010 marked one of the first major recycling events attended by Caroline Spelman after being handed the environment brief as part of the coalition government (see letsrecycle.com story).