Agenda and minutes

Venue: Committee Room 2, Shire Hall

Contact: Isabelle Moorhouse  Trainee Democratic Services Officer

Items
No. Item

1.

Election of Chair and Vice-Chair

To elect the Chair and Vice-Chair of the partnership for this election term.

Minutes:

Councillor Daren Pemberton nominated Councillor Heather Timms to be Chair of the Warwickshire Waste Partnership for the election term. This was seconded by Councillor Ian Shenton.

 

Councillor Timms nominated Councillor Ian Shenton to be Vice-Chair of the Warwickshire Waste Partnership for the election term. This was seconded by Councillor Pemberton.

 

Resolved

That Councillor Heather Timms be Chair and Councillor Ian Shenton be Vice-Chair of the Warwickshire Waste Partnership for the election term.

2.

General

2(1)

Apologies

Minutes:

Dan Green (Rugby Borough Council) was substituted by Anton Cuscito (Interim Transport & Waste Manager)

2(2)

Disclosures of Pecuniary and Non-Pecuniary Interests

Members are required to register their disclosable pecuniary interests within 28 days of their election of appointment to the Council. ?Any changes to matters registered or new matters that require to be registered must be notified to the Monitoring Officer as soon as practicable after they arise.

 

A member attending a meeting where a matter arises in which they have a disclosable pecuniary interest must (unless ?they have a dispensation):

 

        Declare the interest if ?they have not already registered it

        Not participate in any discussion or vote

        Leave the meeting room until the matter has been dealt with

        Give written notice of any unregistered interest to the Monitoring Officer within 28 days of the meeting

 

Non-pecuniary interests relevant to the agenda should be declared at the commencement of the meeting.

 

The public reports referred to are available on the Warwickshire Web https://democracy.warwickshire.gov.uk/uuCoverPage.aspx?bcr=1

 

Minutes:

None.

2(3)

Chair's Announcement

Minutes:

None.

2(4)

Minutes of the previous meeting, including matters arising pdf icon PDF 212 KB

Minutes:

The minutes of the 14 March 2021 were approved as true and correct record.

3.

Waste Management Performance Data pdf icon PDF 653 KB

Provisional data for the year 2020 - 2021

Minutes:

Andrew Pau (Strategy and Commissioning Manager (Waste & Environment) stated that the 2020/21 household waste data was provisional until accepted by the Environment Agency. The reuse and recycling rate increased by 4500 tonnes, but the percentage increase was only 0.8%; composting rates were static and decreased by 1.2% which led to the overall recycling, composting and reuse rate to fall by 0.4%. Residual waste (the waste left after recycling and composting) increased by 11,000 tonnes/4.3% but more people were at home during the Covid-19 pandemic. Warwickshire’s increases were modest compared to some neighbouring authorities. Over 100,000 tonnes of waste was sent to Energy From Waste facilities in 2020/21 which was 9,500 tonnes more than 2019/20, 27,000 tonnes of waste was landfilled which was 3000 tonnes less than the previous year. Dry recycling tonnage had increased for all boroughs and districts but there was a slight reduction in the recycling and composting percentage with 50.7% of waste being re-used/recycled/composted; on average each household is producing over a tonne of waste was produced which had increased this year. Normally, the recycling centre targets are 58% with a 60% average for recycled materials at the centres but the average had decreased due to the closure of the HWRCs and the booking system, more kerbside collection of recycling and green waste had taken place. In 2020/21, boroughs and districts collected 20,000 tonnes more waste at the kerbside when compared with the previous year. Over the last two years, there had been on average a 5% increase in recycled/composted/reused waste or an 11,000 increase in tonnes.  The HWRCs collected 7000 tonnes less waste in 2020/21.

 

In response to Councillor Margaret Bell, Andrew Pau stated that the decrease in waste at recycling centres was not good or bad if waste was separated and reused, recycled and composted where appropriate. Waste at recycling centres decreased by 1/3 and traffic decreased by 2/3 which meant that people were bringing more recyclable material to the centres in one journey than making multiple journeys. It was predicted that more people will take waste to recycling centres when lockdown ends.

 

Councillor Bell suggested some booking free days for recycling centres as she had received pushback from her residents. The Chair noted that as social distancing was enforced until July 2021, the booking system would stay in place until then.

 

Councillors Pemberton, Sarah Millar and Kathryn Lawrence all praised the booking system at their local recycling centres. Councillor Pemberton noted that every area has different experiences but not having cars’ engines running while queuing up benefited the environment. He added that a consultation could be done with the public and centres to improve the booking system. The Chair agreed with this and added that ongoing consultations were taking place with neighbouring authorities.

 

Councillor Millar agreed with Councillor Pemberton and suggested a strategic approach with the staff at recycling centres.

Councillor Lawrence noted how quickly booking slots went at recycling centres and suggested keeping recycling centres open longer during the summer.

The Chair noted  ...  view the full minutes text for item 3.

4.

National Waste Strategy Update pdf icon PDF 133 KB

Summary of responses for Extended Producer Responsibility and Deposit Return Scheme consultations, overview and discussion of consistent collections consultation

Minutes:

Ruth Dixon (Lead Commissioner - Waste Strategy & Contracts) informed the partnership that the National Resources and Waste Strategy was launched in December 2018 followed by three consultations which ran over 12 weeks in Spring 2019. The second round of consultations was delayed because of Brexit and Covid-19 and was launched in March 2021. The Environment Bill is currently going through House of Lords and had its second reading in June 2021. The partnership responded to the government’s plans on the deposit return scheme and extended producer responsibility on the 3rd June 2021.

 

The deposit return scheme (DRS) is likely to be for drink containers e.g. glass/plastic bottles and drink cans, but was unlikely to include plastic milk bottles, drink pouches and Tetrapak/cartons. Everything collected would go for recycling and a deposit would be paid on purchase by the consumer which would be between 10-20p per item; deposits would be paid back when packaging was returned. The partnership (in their response to the consultation) expressed their support for an ‘on the go’ system for drinks rather than drinks that would be consumed at home as this would help reduce litter. Officers were concerned about the potential impact of an ‘all in’ deposit return scheme on low income families without private transport as they would struggle to get their deposits back. The partnership’s consultation response suggested the DRS should take drinks bottles that were less than 700 millilitres and that wine bottles should be collected at kerbsides to keep space in the reverse vending machines. They did not support a digital solution to collection from kerbside as there would have been a lot of issues with it, which were listed in their response.

 

In response to Councillor Bell’s concerns regarding local authority responsibility and uncollected deposits, Ruth Dixon clarified that anything collected by the reverse vending machines/online retailers will be the DRS’ responsibility to dispose of and not the councils. The partnership asked for unclaimed deposits to be returned to local authorities as they would be disposing of these materials. This waste would likely go to the new MRF where its AI should be identify DRS items. The response asked for all cost for the handling of this to be funded: collection, recycling and disposal. Central Government may change their preferred plans depending on responses to the consultation.

 

Ruth Dixon continued that government’s plans also included an ambitious extended producer responsibility (EPR) scheme for packaging which will require the producer (and retailer) of the product to pay local authorities for the collection, sorting and disposal of their product’s packaging (excluding DRS packaging). The producer would also have to pay for any of their product’s packaging found in litter bins and as litter on the ground. The more recyclable and lighter the product material is, then the less the producer would pay. The partnership strongly supported this idea in their response to the consultation and stated EPR incentivises better resource management, make recycling easier and influences producers to improve their packaging. They  ...  view the full minutes text for item 4.

5.

Development of the Warwickshire Joint Municipal Waste Management Strategy

Minutes:

This item will be discussed in September’s meeting.

6.

Waste Partners Update pdf icon PDF 305 KB

Additional documents:

Minutes:

The updates were taken as read in the report.

7.

Update on litter and flytipping including report/letter on review of environmental sentencing pdf icon PDF 200 KB

Additional documents:

Minutes:

Glen McGrandle informed the partnership that a meeting was held on the 13th May with their current partnership enforcement team where they provided the blueprints of what is being undertaken on behalf of Nuneaton and Bedworth Borough Council. Litter patrols were undertaken in Nuneaton and Bedworth hotspots and fly tipping enforcement patrols were monitoring hotspots. Action was taken against offenders as there was enough publication on not infringing waste laws and prosecutions were made.

 

Councillor Horner said that he carried out an online survey where 75% of people surveyed in his division said that they wanted the district to do more to improve litter and fly-tipping.

 

Councillor Evans queried if the partnership had any data on how many section 215 notices were issued annually (landowners legally must clear fly tipping waste on their land) under the Town and Country Planning Act.

 

Richard Dobbs suggested that the borough and district fly tipping enforcement teams should join together to help tackle this issue.

 

Glen McGrandle suggested reviewing what legislative tools could be used by councils to fight against litter like the Highways Act to deal with fly tipping and graffiti; this would bring in more people and resources to help with everyone’s own service area. Richard Dobbs agreed with this and suggested parking enforcers also being litter enforcers.

 

A future meeting on this topic was agreed to be arranged.

 

Resolved

The Waste Partnership agrees for the Chair to co-sign the final waste crime letter drafted by Hertfordshire Fly Tipping Group which requests the Sentencing Council reviews the 2014 Sentencing guidelines in relation to waste crime.

 

8.

Action on Climate change

Minutes:

This item will be discussed at September’s meeting.

9.

Agenda item suggestions for next meeting

Minutes:

  • Development of the Warwickshire Joint Municipal Waste Management Strategy
  • Action on Climate change
  • Update on the MRF project

10.

Dates of future meetings

229th September 202114:00

8th December 2021 14:00

Minutes:

·       29th September 2021

·       8th December 2021