REFUSE REFLECTIONS: I have a confession. I am still not a DRS person.
Those with unusually good memories, or unusually little to do, may remember that the first Waste Whisperer column questioned whether a Deposit Return Scheme was what the UK really needed. My concern was whether a model with a strong international track record would work as neatly in a mature and entrenched UK collection system, particularly when many of the containers in scope are already collected at the kerbside. I worried about cost, unclaimed deposits, the value removed from council collections and whether drinks containers were really the litter problem we most urgently needed to solve.
I wanted to be proved wrong. I still do.
So it feels slightly awkward to find myself reading a call for another pause and thinking, please, not another delay.
Six MRF operators, Timberpak Pearce, Grundon, Levenseat, N+P, Sherbourne and Yorwaste, have written to the Government asking for a “time-limited, transparent whole-system review” of DRS before a revised timetable is confirmed.
Their case starts with the economics. PET bottles and aluminium cans are light, but valuable. Remove them and MRFs have less commodity income to support the cost of sorting everything else. Around one in five in-scope containers could still arrive at the kerbside too, leaving an awkward question over who pays to collect, sort and recycle them.
Councils are now raising the same issue from the other end of the system. LARAC says Defra’s forecast saving of 69p per household fails to reflect lost material income, higher gate fees and changes to collection contracts. In the four actions reported, however, LARAC does not ask for the rollout to be paused. That distinction matters: Review the system, certainly, but do not let review become shorthand for delay.
The remaining material mix matters too. Fewer beverage cans could leave aerosols and other pressurised containers making up more of the remaining aluminium stream, with implications for fire risk, handling and marketability. DRS should also produce cleaner PET, although cleaner material is no guarantee of British recycling. If domestic food-grade capacity and end markets cannot absorb it, the material may still leave the country.
Government should already be able to answer these questions. My first column asked whether we had thought through the effect on kerbside economics and the system DRS would need around it. The letter from MRF operators suggests that question remains open. It is tempting to say “I told you so”, but this anonymous industry columnist is insufferable enough already.
Still, yet another pause around waste policy does make me wince.
DRS now carries two uncertainties: How it will work and whether its timetable will survive. A review might reduce the first while deepening the second.
Businesses can plan around an unpopular policy. They can model the cost, renegotiate contracts and decide whether an investment still stacks up. A MRF upgrading its line, a council redesigning collections, a reprocessor considering new capacity and a retailer installing reverse vending machines all need dependable assumptions about material flows, income and timing.
When those assumptions keep moving, waiting becomes rational. Upgrades are deferred, existing contracts extended and chequebooks stay closed while everyone waits to see whether government means it this time. The infrastructure then fails to arrive, which becomes the case for another delay.
The operators cite the postponement of mandatory flexible plastic collections and the delay to bringing waste incineration into the UK ETS. DRS, they argue, should meet the same standard: Settle the policy, understand the consequences and give affected organisations time to prepare.
I understand the logic, although the precedent worries me. If every delay becomes evidence for the next, the waste reform programme starts to resemble a railway departure board during signalling failure.
Government still needs to resolve serious design questions. Pressing ahead regardless could weaken kerbside services and leave somebody else to absorb the bill. The operators have at least asked for the review to be time-limited. That makes the proposal more defensible, provided the limit is real.
Such a review needs a published remit, a fixed evidence deadline, a decision date and a named owner. It should examine how DRS interacts with pEPR, Simpler Recycling, TEEP-led changes and separate fibre collections; settle who pays for containers left at the kerbside; and address the residual aluminium stream and UK reprocessing capacity. Meanwhile, work that does not prejudge the findings should continue.
If the evidence demands changes, make them and then hold the decision. Months of limbo, another consultation and another revised date would leave everyone less willing to invest next time.
The UK has debated, redesigned and delayed DRS for years. We have even appointed the organisation that will run it. Yet MRF operators are still asking government to assess the cumulative effect on their businesses.
None of this has persuaded me to join the DRS fan club. A scheme can be very good at collecting bottles and cans while still offering an incomplete answer to the wider problem. The scepticism remains, although the patience is wearing thinner.
I still want to be proved wrong about DRS. Operators and local authorities need answers to their questions, and quickly. Give the review a hard stop, publish the evidence, settle the remaining design issues and hold the timetable.
At some point, the scheme has to stop returning to the drawing board long enough for investors, operators and the rest of us to find out whether it works.
Until next time,
Keep it sorted.
The Waste Whisperer
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