Judicial Review hearing ‘expected in February’

A senior Defra official has revealed that a court hearing for the Judicial Review over commingling is expected in February next year.

Richard Pullen, deputy director for climate, waste and atmosphere at Defra, told the annual Local Authority RecyclingAdvisory Committee (LARAC)conference in Warwickshire yesterday (October 17) that the department was expecting to defend the Waste (England and Wales) Regulations in court in early 2013.

Mr Pullensaid: “Defra and the Welsh Government will be defending the revised regulations and we expect the Judicial Review to continue and a hearing to be early next year.”

Mr Pullen told letsrecycle.com that the likely time was late February 2013.

The Judicial Review is focused on how far separate collections of recyclables should be a mandatory requirement for councils in relation to the collection of paper, plastics, metals and glass from 2015, and how much discretion there should be for local authorities to take a commingled approach, as set out in the revised EU Waste Framework Directive (rWFD).

It is being brought by a group of reprocessors who submitted an application to re-start proceedings last month after an original hearing in December 2011 was adjourned(see letsrecycle.com story).

Once the Judicial Review is resolved, Mr Pullen said that Defra would be producing guidance to help local authorities implement the requirements of the rWFD, especially in relation to the collection of recyclables. He said: “That is something we will be working on in due course.”

Quality

One of the requirements of the Directive is for high quality recycling and Mr Pullen said that improving the quality of recyclables was a ‘live issue’ for Defra and something which could create both economic and environmental benefits.

As part of this, the Department is proposing to consult on a MRF code of practice in the near future which will require sampling of the inputs and outputs of MRFs and transparency about their performance. Plans for a similar code were recently launched for consultation in Scotland (see letsrecycle.com story). It is hoped that such transparency would increase pressure on MRF operators to improve quality.

Mr Pullen said: “The code will provide two benefits – it will be a tool for measuring inputs and outputs and provide economic benefits and for customers it will provide the opportunity to identify the best performing MRFs”.