A statement from Biffpack broadly welcomed the recommendations laid out by the energy, industry and transport subcommittee of the House of Lords in its report into the costs to industry associated with the EC packaging waste regulations (see letsrecycle.com story).
However, while agreeing with the Lords' call for the tightening of enforcement procedures on non-compliance and the minimisation of changes to the directive that are not supported by sound environmental impact assessments, the statement from the compliance scheme disagreed with the committee's stance on targets.
One of the compliance schemes that originally gave evidence to the Lords' inquiry on packaging waste regulations, Biffpack's statement said: “We feel that the recommendation to support a 65% target for 2008 needs to be revisited, as we believe that this will push the targets beyond a reasonable possibility of success.”
Currently in the process of changing management, with Helen Burfield due to take over as compliance manager this month, Biffpack warned about the extra material needed to meet the 65% target. In the statement, the compliance scheme said that the additional one million tonnes needed, over and above the 500,000 to one million tonnes needed to reach the original 55% target, would have to come from household waste.
“This will, in our opinion, be a step too far,” the statement said.
Biffpack supported the Lords' suggestion for a single strategic body to be set up to oversee the packaging industry's progress in meeting the EU recycling targets, but said that for such a body to be effective, it would need to “act across the UK including Scotland and Northern Ireland”.
The report from the House of Lords energy, industry and transport sub-committee is available here.
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