Examination of Witness (Questions 40 -
42)
MR PETER
JONES
TUESDAY 24 OCTOBER 2000
40. You mentioned earlier in answer to the Chairman
that this is a DETR document. Do you think other government departments
could buy into it more than they have done?
(Mr Jones) Certainly if you look at where the big
issue in terms of the biggest environmental threat is, it has
to be around carbon. I would have thought that if you are looking
at a waste strategy in terms of the carbon in the industrial and
commercial streams and municipal streams you would include people
in the debates, like MAFF, because (in the context of domestic
refuse) 50 per cent—maybe more in some cases—is compostable.
Paper, card, clothing, the lot, could be composted. There is no
market for this material because we are talking here of tonnages
of the order of 15 million tonnes. That somehow has to be integrated
with the debate that MAFF is having in terms of the crisis facing
British agriculture and the switch to bio-fuel. I did not detect
any of that trans-boundary discussion taking place. What happens
in agriculture has a key bearing on how we might manage a big
slug of our organic arisings—mainly from domestic, but also
from industrial and commercial sources—should we decide
that we do not want to burn them, which is the other route.
41. So, how should a department like MAFF be
able to clearly demonstrate that they have bought into this process?
(Mr Jones) I have seen senior MAFF officials and I
believe that they are now beginning to see—
42. They are not really transparent if everybody
cannot see them?
(Mr Jones) I certainly detected that they are now
beginning to realise the enormity of this. These boundaries exist
because of the chimneys in government. What we are talking about
here as an issue is that a major effluent stream has value (both
in areas that the DTI look at and MAFF look at.) If this is a
very complex subject and if this is to be a national Waste Strategy,
one would have assumed that it has a national buy-in across all
departments. Sadly, I think that the DETR, and now the DTI, are
well aware of that, but I am not so sure about their colleagues
in other divisions.
Chairman: I have to cut you off at that point.
I am tempted to ask you whether farmers should really take their
potato peelings back? Thank you very much indeed.
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