Responding to the Guidance on weekly rubbish collections report dubbed the bin bible by the Department for Communities and Local Government (DCLG) local authorities and waste firms criticised Eric Pickles office for undermining the efforts of councils and obscuring larger issues.
The report, published on Saturday (January 4), contains case studies of councils that have maintained weekly collections and a list of 10 myths the department claims are used to promote fortnightly services. The guidance is aimed at encouraging councils to deliver better services for tax payers.
Chartered Institution of Wastes Management (CIWM) chief executive Steve Lee argued the language used to describe alternate weekly waste collections in the report was insulting and misleading in its assertions over the cost of collections and disposal.
He said: While it is very welcome to have good practice examples from those local authorities who were successful in securing funding from DCLGs Weekly Collection Support Scheme, this guidance is potentially damaging from a number of perspectives.
‘Insulting’
It is insulting in its use of provocative terms such as eager and idle to describe councils who have moved to fortnightly (or alternate weekly) collections. It is misleading in its assertions over the cost of waste management collection and disposal, which may be a small proportion of the average Council Tax bill but represents the third largest area of spend for local authorities.
‘In ESA’s view, local authorities are likely to find the DCLG Bin Bible deeply unhelpful. It is not objective Government guidance, couched in measured language, but a one-sided argument against fortnightly collections.’
Barry Dennis, ESA director-general
By creating more unhelpful debate over the frequency issue, Mr Pickles office undermines these efforts and obscures the bigger issue, which is that waste is a significant cost to our society and, rather than having a basic right to weekly waste collections, we have a collective responsibility to create less and recycle more.
Meanwhile the Local Authority Recycling Advisory Committee (LARAC), the body representing council recycling officers, added that fortnightly collections of waste have been shown to work well, and that the guidance from DCLG was contrary to the governments idea of localism.
LARAC vice chair Andrew Bird told letsrecycle.com: Our views are that it is somewhat undermining local authorities and we can find evidence that fortnightly collections do work with high resident satisfaction rates. The key is to make sure the service is well designed with residents very much involved in that process.
We should be tailoring services to local needs, so it seems rather ironic that Mr Pickles says residents should be pursuing one particular type of collection.
ESA
Also commenting on the document Barry Dennis, director-general of the Environmental Services Association (ESA), the trade body representing the waste management industry, said: There is no one size fits all solution for all local areas and both weekly and fortnightly systems can work well, depending on circumstances.
In ESA’s view, local authorities are likely to find the DCLG Bin Bible deeply unhelpful. It is not objective Government guidance, couched in measured language, but a one-sided argument against fortnightly collections. It will be of little or no help to hard-pressed councils who are trying to maintain local services.”
Eric Pickles has come in for criticism from some sections of the waste industry previously, with CIWM accusing the minister of using misleading language, after he had branded council bin fine powers as barmy in July 2013 (see letsrecycle.com story).
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