The contract, which was formally awarded earlier this week (March 1), will see the French-owned company become responsible for household waste and recycling collections, theoperation of two household reuse and recycling centres, street cleansing, graffiti removal and winter gritting.
Veolia will take over from services firm Enterprise, which established Haringey Enterprise to carry out waste and recycling collections under the existing contract which expires at the end of this month.
The integrated waste management contract with Veolia is set to run for 14 years with an option to run for a further seven. And, according to the council, it will be worth up to 16.85 million per year.
Haringey indicated that the main aims of the contract would be to achieve 2 million-a-year in savings on operational costs and also ensure that the North London borough achieved a recycling rate of over 40% by 2015.
Service
Under the contract, Veolia intends to change the household waste and recycling collection service. It will retain theweekly collection of recyclable material but move it from the existing green box system to a 240 litre wheeled bin.
In addition, from January 2012, the company and the council will phase in a fortnightly collection for residual waste. This will replace the existing weekly collections. Weekly food and garden waste collections will remain as they are.
Councillor Nilgun Carver, cabinet member for neighbourhoods at Haringey, said: Its important to realise that under this new regime up to 75% of household waste will still be collected weekly. All recycling will be easier with the new larger wheelie bins replacing the small green boxes, meaning the recycling waste can be contained and spill into gardens.
Contract
Haringey will also be able to offer residents free bulky waste collections under the new contract for items that are recyclable or reusable. For material which cannot be reused or recycled, the local authority will charge 17.20 for up to six items.
Thedeal bolsters Veolias portfolio of contracts in the capital. The company already works with the City of Westminster, Lambeth, Bromley, Tower Hamlets, Brent, Camden, Croydon, Kingston-upon-Thames and Richmond-upon-Thames.
Haringey agreed to name Veolia as preferred bidder for the deal in December 2010 before finalising the terms. Services firm May Gurney had also been named on a three-bidder shortlist before it was shortened to Veolia and Enterprise.
Pascal Hauret, Veolias London municipal operations director, said: We believe that our proposals will help Haringey achieve its objectives of reducing carbon emissions, increasing recycling and increasing resident perception of the services, while at the same time offering significant cost savings.
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