The council has been given 52.19 million from the Strategic Waste Fund to put towards an expansion of its blue bin paper collection scheme from 52,000 households to 119,200 households. The council's fortnightly brown-bin green waste collections will also expand to 120,000 homes, while six civic amenity sites will be developed into recycling centres.
Announcing the award, Scotland's environment minister Ross Finnie said: “This substantial funding will help ensure many more North Lanarkshire citizens have access to recycling facilities.
“By providing this long-term funding we are helping North Lanarkshire council meet their targets for waste minimisation, recycling and reduction in landfill,” he added.
The funding, which covers the period up to 2020, will help the council reach its targets of recycling or composting 28% of waste in North Lanarkshire by 2005/06. The total value of the grant amounts to 10.1 million for the financial years 2004/05 to 2005/06 and 42.09 million from 2006/07 to 2019/2020.
Councillor Jim Logue, who is convenor of the community services committee at North Lanarkshire, welcomed the funding announcement as “terrific news”.
Jobs
The council said the money should see 64 new full-time jobs created at the council, while it will pay for 17 new vehicles and 153,400 new recycling bins. The council will also be able to use the money for its education and awareness programme, “Recycle for Good”, which sees a cash donation to the British Heart Foundation for every percentage increase in the recycling rate.
Cllr Logue said: “We are currently recycling around 14.2 per cent of our waste, which is very encouraging given the poor recycling figures we recorded just four years ago. However, we know that we have to get the key message across about the importance of recycling. That is why an important element of our funding package is the education programme.”
The funding mechanism behind the Scottish Executive's National Waste Plan, the Strategic Waste Fund has awarded 529 million to Scottish councils for recycling activities up until 2020 – including 143 million for the period up to 2005/06.
Minimisation
This week also saw a grant of 200,000 from the Fund awarded to an environmental project in the North East of Scotland, the Business Environment Partnership. The Partnership aims to help companies cut down on the waste that they produce, thereby increasing their profits.
The Partnership has already achieved savings of over 2 million among 250 companies in the North East, the Scottish Executive said. The award of 100,000 to the Partnership in each of the next two years forms part of a 1.5 million portion of the Strategic Waste Fund that has been allocated to business waste minimisation measures.
Commenting on the award, Scotland's deputy enterprise minister Lewis Macdonald said: “This award will allow the organisation to build on its good work and continue to help new companies develop. By implementing simple resource efficiency measures, businesses can cut down on costs, improve productivity and create a healthier, safer working environment for employees.”
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