Stephen Leigh of Burslem-based SS Thermoplastics pleaded guilty to two charges at Stoke on Trent Magistrates on May 27 after a joint investigation between the Agency and Staffordshire police. He was given 100 hours' community service and was told to pay 900 in costs.
Mr Leigh was prosecuted under the Theft Act of 1968, relating to him obtaining monies by deception and false accounting rather than breeching the terms of the Packaging Waste Regulations themselves.
After investigating inconsistencies in reprocessing figures for plastics packaging waste in 2003, Agency officers found Mr Leigh had sold more PRNs than he should have based on the amount of plastics he had recycled.
Criminal
Under the Packaging Waste Regulations, PRNs are the evidence for packaging waste reprocessing which obligated producers buy from reprocessors to demonstrate their obligations under the Packaging Waste Regulations have been carried out.
It is a criminal offence to issue PRNs against non-UK packaging waste or against material above the tonnage of packaging waste received by an accredited reprocessor.
Chris Grove, from the Environment Agency's producer responsibility unit, said: “The first reprocessor has been taken to court for issuing PRNs without the legal ability to do so. The man in question was given 100 hours' community service, but has also agreed to pay back 13,000 of the money received. This shows the police are now taking an interest in this issue.”
SS Thermoplastics was accredited as a plastic packaging recycler able to issue PRNs in 2003. Agency officers attending SS Thermoplastics in April 2004 noticed discrepancies between the amount of PRNs provided to clients and the amount of packaging actually being recycled. The inconsistencies were so serious that the investigation was handed over to the Staffordshire police in June 2004.
Alan Farmer, an Environment Agency officer involved in the investigation, said: “This case and sentence sends a strong message to recyclers that we have a widespread commitment to safeguarding these schemes and ensuring they are properly administered.”
Questions
Other cases of involving possible PRN fraud by plastics reprocessors are currently being dealt with by the police, the Agency confirmed. Mr Grove said it was up to obligated producers and schemes to ensure the PRNs they are contracted to receive actually relate to reprocessing that has been carried out.
Mr Grove indicated that suspect PRNs are still lingering in the marketplace, stating that: “We are just about to write to two compliance schemes that bought 1,000 tonnes of PRNs from a small reprocessor, which is only registered to issue less than 400 tonnes of PRNs a year.”
He told obligated companies: “Something like that should raise questions in your own mind.”
But Mr Grove pointed out that the issue of wrong-fully issued PRNs is a “distraction”, and reminded producers that PRNs only represent packaging waste reprocessing that needs to be carried out. He said compliance schemes and obligated producers should be concentrating to ensure that sufficient reprocessing is being carried out, rather than worrying only about PRNs.
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