Resource Use

Less ‘council bashing’ and more ‘joint-working’ needed to turn around recycling contamination issue – LARAC

Less ‘council bashing’ and more ‘joint-working’ needed to turn around recycling contamination issue – LARAC Councils are being unfairly criticised in the fallout to a sharp rise of household recycling contamination, according to the Local Authority Recycling Advisory Committee (LARAC).

Andrew Bird, Chair of LARAC, which represents council recycling officers in the UK, says that the industry should be working with local authorities rather than blaming them, remarking that few other industries ‘so publicly help create myths and difficulties for itself by talking about confusion so often’.

Earlier this week, it was reported a freedom of information request by the BBC had revealed that the amount of recycling that is being rejected due to contamination in England has increased by 84 per cent in the last four years.

Though this equates to less than 3.5 per cent of the amount of household waste that is collected for recycling, the rise from 184,000 tonnes being rejected in 2011/12 to 338,000 tonnes in 2014/15 has caused worry that residents may lose confidence in their recycling systems.

The Local Government Association told the BBC that the figures are down to ‘widespread confusion over what can and cannot be recycled’, suggesting that a more harmonised system of collection across the country – something that the Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs has vowed to pursue – would help.

However, Bird says that a harmonised system is “not the answer”, with councils offering “well-publicised and well-run collection services” that are a “function of the materials on the market and the economic reprocessing facilities available”.

More joint working, less ‘council bashing’

Indeed, according to LARAC, the issue is that residents ‘generally know’ what can go in their own recycling schemes but are more aware of schemes in other areas with differences. The range of plastic packaging used causes particular problems, it states.

Bird says that councils “cannot compel” residents to use their services, and that their powers to do so have been limited in recent years. He suggests that rather than turning on the councils, the waste and resources industry should work together to help them promote their collection schemes.

A statement from LARAC released yesterday after the story had been picked up by national media read: ‘The uneven reprocessing network and difficulties with the economic viability of plastic recycling is also a big barrier for local authorities in this area… This shows it is an industry wide issue that needs coming together and joint working and less council bashing if it is to be taken forward constructively.’

Andrew Bird
Bird added: “It is disappointing that as an industry we talk about confusion when it comes to recycling and help perpetuate the myth. Councils work hard to promote their services and give residents clear guidelines about what can be accepted.

“With ongoing funding cuts, we need to look at new ways of getting funds into the whole collection system via policies such as extended producer responsibility and direct charging schemes.”

Industry can fill in gaps of reduced council communications

Mandy Kelly, Recycling Manager at drinks carton recycler ACE UK, agreed that industry can work with councils to assist with communications, an area that has particularly suffered with budget cuts: “There is a clear link between information, public engagement in recycling and the quality of recyclable material being collected. Over the past few years, ACE UK has seen first-hand the impact of budget cuts on local authority waste teams.

“The priority for councils has of course been to maintain front-line services and communications budgets have often been a casualty when making savings. Unfortunately this is now translating into rising quality issues and flatlining recycling rates. This is an area where the industry can provide valuable support to our colleagues in the public sector.”

‘Onus on local authorities’

Among those that have suggested that local authorities could go a long way to improving the issue of contamination is Simon Ellin, Chief Executive of the Recycling Association, who pointed out that though a harmonised system could help, the UK has never had one before and so the causes lie elsewhere: “Consistency of collection would improve the quality achieved, but there is a fundamental lack of understanding by the householder in the first place which goes beyond this. The collection system is irrelevant if householders are not trained sufficiently to use it.

“The onus is on local authorities to get this right in the first place. They must also audit output quality and help regulate who handles the material and where it goes. This last point is important as the reality is that there are UK recyclers who continue to operate at sub-standard (and sometimes illegal) levels. They are deliberately flouting regulations, trying to trade low quality materials.

“These illegal operators have, in the past, provided an outlet for sub-standard materials and local authorities and regulators, along with The Recycling Association, need to work together to put a stop to this.

“While we don’t want to see recyclables landfilled, we welcome rejections by the waste management companies if we are to move forward and improve our industry in the long-term. What we’re seeing now should be a period of short term pain followed by a period of realignment.”

Co-mingling collections have highest reject rates

Other commentators have highlighted that councils offering co-mingled recycling collections suffer the highest rates of recycling rejection, suggesting that the system – rather than householders or council communications – is to blame.

Speaking to Resource, Andy Moore, Campaigner for UK Recyclate, said: “Systems which collect the recyclable material co-mingled and then attempt to sort it mechanically produce inferior quality materials and reject much more than systems which collect recyclables separately. The best systems comply with the EU Waste Framework Directive and the Waste Regulations. These require that paper, glass, metals and plastic are collected separately. Many local authorities, especially those in the West of England and Wales deliver just such a service. Work by Welsh Government and WRAP has shown that separate collection is optimal financially as well as environmentally. It is the method that Defra itself recommends.”

More information on the rise in contamination figures can be found in Resource’s previous news story.

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