London scrambles to appoint recycling board

The Board will be responsible for handing out £60 million of funding to the boroughs over the next three years – but there is a battle to get its seven members appointed quickly, since funding is allocated from April 1.

The London Waste and Recycling Board is being established to provide a strategic direction to the development of waste infrastructure in the capital as an alternative to the Mayor's unsuccessful attempt to set up a single London waste authority.

With the Mayor refusing to take part, ministers have asked London Councils to seek seven members for the Board including four borough councillors and three non-borough representatives.

Once the members have been appointed, and a Statutory Instrument has been signed off by Parliament, the Board will have the task of handing out the £60 million fund.

Prior to the Statutory Instrument getting the green light from MPs – around May or June 2008 – the Board will exist in “shadow” form to speed up the process of handing out the money.

Inviting applications for the Board, London Councils chairman Cllr Merrick Cockell explained: “In the interim, government has asked us to set up the board in shadow form in order for the work of the LWaRB to begin in earnest. Our expectation is for members appointed to the shadow board through this process to go on to form the actual Board once established.”

The closing date for applications has been set at March 13, with appointments to be made on April 1.

Fund

London Councils has already researched the London waste authorities' priorities with regard to the new London Waste and Recycling Fund. This research included a survey of London waste authorities by Enviros Consulting, and looked at strategic priorities and possible priorities for the funding.

Emerging findings from the research suggest that authorities want the Fund to help them meet recycling targets, build landfill diversion capacity and also focus on waste minimisation.

The boroughs are keen on a bidding process for funds, which they feel should be particularly used on new and expanded recycling schemes and to build infrastructure – especially anaerobic digestion facilities.

The fund itself will hand out £22.8m in 2008/09, £22.8m in 2009/10 and £14.4m in 2010/11, according to minister Joan Ruddock. It effectively takes over from the annual £19 million of funding from the Waste Performance and Efficiency Grant that was shared out among individual boroughs up to 2007/08, but was not ring-fenced for waste projects.

In a letter to London Councils in December 2007, Mrs Ruddock told the boroughs she wanted this funding allocated quickly, but that it should be spent “strategically on projects which will result in a lasting and substantive improvement in London”.

It is understood that the money which the Mayor was going to put into the Fund – up to £6 million a year – will now be spent by the London Development Agency (LDA) on commercial waste issues.