Profile: Kay Twitchen, Essex county councilor

While her early career, working in insurance until the age of 30, was far removed from politics, Cllr Twitchen does recall sitting in the road in her early twenties outside the Russian embassy in London on a 'ban the bomb' march. However, she says: “As you get older you realise that's not the way to change the world – you can only do that through the political process.”

Cllr Twitchen made a formal entrance into the Conservative party in Southend in her early 40s. And in 1989 when a vacancy came up for a county councillor, she took up the challenge – a decision which marked the beginning of an impressive (and continuing) career in politics.

Initially, Cllr Twitchen wanted to become a councillor so she could change the state of the social services for children in Essex. However, once she got into politics, she recognised the need for someone to take a lead on environmental and waste management issues in the county council. She says: “With the Landfill Directive on the horizon, I saw that there was an urgent need for change.”

LGA

In 2000, Cllr Twitchen was thrown into the heart of politics when she became chairman of the Local Government Association's waste and environmental executive. Within weeks of taking up this position, the Government issued the Waste Strategy 2000. It was the first time local authorities were given recycling targets so lots of media attention was on the LGA and its new chairman.

Cllr Twitchen explains: “I had to learn very quickly to think on behalf of district councils, mets, county councils, waste collections, and waste disposals and represent all their interests simultaneously. It was also my first time dealing with the media and doing radio TV interviews.”

A year later when the fridge crisis hit in 2001, the environment was yet again in the spotlight. Cllr Twitchen found herself working closely with the environment Minister at the time, Michael Meacher to respond to the 'rather chaotic situation'.

Not a naturally outspoken person, Cllr Twitchen describes herself as someone who has “become more outspoken” and sure of her views as she has got older.

Environment Agency

In addition to her part time appointment at the LGA and role as an Essex county councillor, Cllr Twitchen took on another role as regional environment protection committee chairman for the Environment Agency. In September 2003 she joined the board of the Agency with a particular responsibility for the Anglican region, and begun chairing the resources board advisory group, which is concerned with waste management.

In 2003 Cllr Twitchen's achievements in her work with local government were formally recognised with an OBE. However, her OBE didn't lead to complacency; if anything it furthered her resolve to be at the forefront of tackling waste issues.
WRAP

When the Waste & Resources Action Programme (WRAP) was first launched, Cllr Twitchen remembers thinking ” this organisation has the potential to change so much that was wrong with recycling and waste management.”

Joining WRAP as a non executive Board Member six years ago, Cllr Twitchen is today very positive about the headway the organisation is making and the impact it is having on raising public awareness.

Essex

Of all her appointments, Cllr Twitchen is most proud of her work in Essex, in particular of her role in pulling together the Essex waste strategy partnership – made up of 12 district councils, the unitary council in Southend, and the county council. She reveals: “In all my career, getting those councils working together has been the best and the most difficult thing.” And the strategy is clearly working – with Essex's recycling rate just under 40%.

The partnership, led by the county council, recently submitted a PFI bid for £90 million pounds of PFI credit to finance plans to build £300 million of waste management infrastructure.

Ms Twitchen explains: “We are in the process of resubmitting our business case to Defra – and this has to be handed in by the end of July, Our aims are to reduce landfill, meet our LATS targets and improve resource efficiency. At the moment we are very interested in PFI because the credits make it an attractive prospect, however the final decision hasn't been made yet.”

Challenges for the sector

In her opinion, Cllr Twitchen says there are two major challenges for the sector: getting the new infrastructure on the ground to replace landfill and moving towards dealing with commercial and domestic waste simultaneously.

With the input of councillors, waste management companies, academics, ESA, NGOS Friends of the Earth, Cllr Twitchen submitted some of these ideas in the Quality of Life policy review – a report written to help the Conservatives develop their party policy. In her 20 page report, Cllr Twitchen outlined what the priorities for waste should be and this included a “template for managing all wastes under one umbrella rather than dividing them up artificially.”

Cllr Twitchen's priorities are constantly on the move, however she revealed that what has keeping her awake at night this month, is an opinion she has to write on the climate change adaptation measures green paper – for the committee of the regions environment commission. The committee is a local government body for Europe where Cllr Twitchen represents the UK.

Future

As for the future of the sector, with all her roles, Cllr Twitchen hopes that the recent increase in public awareness about recycling and the prioritising of environmental issues, continues. She says: “David Miliband was a very strong environment secretary and I would like to see that strength carried forward. We desperately need more political leadership on these issues.”