Future of Public Recycling Facilities in Cornwall Council Car Parks

 

 

Future of public recycling facilities in Cornwall Council car parks was discussed at the Neighbourhoods Overview and Scrutiny Committee in October as part of the wider discussion on future of the waste collection and cleansing contract – full report here .

SERVICE DESIGN – PREFERRED OPTIONS RECOMMENDED TO CABINET (and where the issue re household recycling facilities in car parks arises from)

1.   The current fortnightly segregated kerbside recycling collections are changed to a weekly frequency in order to improve recycling performance.
2.   The current kerbside recycling containers (bags and boxes) are retained.
3. Extra recycling containers are made available on request, at no cost to residents, in order to maintain high value recyclables.
4. Food waste is collected at the kerbside on a weekly basis, with a separate kerbside container and kitchen caddie provided to residents.
5. Food waste is processed through an Anaerobic Digestion process.
6. In order to reduce waste and improve recycling rates, the current weekly kerbside residual collections are moved to a fortnightly frequency.
7. The kerbside collection of residual waste is restricted to 180 litres maximum (typically two full black sacks), with a ‘no side waste’ policy introduced.
8. A strategic high-level review of the Integrated Waste Management Contract is undertaken.
9. The opportunities for receiving additional waste from out of Cornwall at the Cornwall Energy Recovery Centre is explored as a means of mitigating cost and capacity issues.
10. All Cornwall Council household recycling banks are removed. (These are the ones in Council car parks)

At its meeting on 19 April the Neighbourhood Overview and Scrutiny Committee will consider this further. See what is stated in the work programme below.

Waste Collection and Cleansing Contract
Following the Waste Inquiry & informal Member briefing in December 2017 regarding the proposed scope of work, report to review the following:
(i) Further commercial waste opportunities to ensure that non-household premises are provided with an effective kerbside service for their waste;
(ii) Impacts of future devolution packages; and
(iii) Street and beach cleansing aspect of the Contract and the rationale for the provision (any change would only be when every household can have recycling collected from home on a weekly basis from 2020)

The reason the committee is recommending the removal of the recycling facility in car parks is because local businesses regularly use them, at a cost to Council tax payers when they should be paying for their recycling to be collected and disposed of. This will not affect facilities in supermarkets and it might be that more pressure should be put on ALL supermarkets (perhaps over a certain size) to provide customer recycling points as they are largely responsible for the excessive packaging people end up with! I know the increased use of buying things over the Internet has increased packaging that needs recycling so perhaps there is something for all of us to think about there!

Anyone wanting to have there say on this can email the committee on neighbourhoodsosc@cornwall.gov.uk and ask that there views be made available to committee members. The committee will also make recommendations to me re what sorts of containers should be given to residents for waste and recycling so you might want to email on that too.

The decisions re Waste at Cabinet on 7 February can be seen at item 14 by clicking this link but the decisions/ recommendations are below:

DECISION:

RESOLVED:

1. That Cabinet approved the draft Cornwall Council Household Resources & Waste Strategy attached in Appendix 1 to the report to proceed to public consultation, with any amendments to be agreed by the Portfolio Holder in consultation with the Strategic Director before being recommended to full Council in April 2018.
2. That Cabinet approved the Neighbourhoods Overview & Scrutiny Committee Inquiry “recommended” and “secondary” service design options, for the collection of household waste, and recycling services (as described in Section 1.2 and 10.1 of the report), into the procurement process for the new waste collection contract. Thereby enabling costs to be established for each option, before a Cabinet decision is made on the new contract.
3. That Cabinet delegates authority to the Portfolio Holder for Environment and Public Protection to determine the containment options (e.g. recycling bags, boxes, wheeled bins, etc.) which were to be specified within the procurement process for the next contract, subject to the Cabinet Member taking into consideration the recommendations on the containment options arising from the Neighbourhoods Overview & Scrutiny Committee meeting on 19 April 2018.