Examination of Witnesses (Questions 40-59)
10 NOVEMBER 2004
MR STEVE
LEE, MR
CHRIS MURPHY
AND MR
ROGER HEWITT
Q40 Paddy Tipping: What
is the problem? Why do we not give you this guidance? Why do they
not tell you what to do? You lads are in the industry. You know
what is what. You know how to do it. Why can we not sort it?
Mr Hewitt: It is
an excellent question.
Q41 Paddy Tipping: What
is the answer?
Mr Hewitt: I wish
I knew.
Q42 Paddy Tipping: What
do you think it is?
Mr Hewitt: What
do I think is the reason they do not do it?
Q43 Paddy Tipping: Yes.
Mr Hewitt: It is
very hard to get behind the thinking of people or organisations
that do not see timescales in the same way as you do. They obviously
see different timescales. They perhaps do not see the same imperatives.
Maybe it is an issue of shortage of staff—it is very difficult
to say—but you can be certain that our request for this
action has become more vociferous at each meeting. At the next
meeting of the Hazardous Waste Forum on 24 November you can be
sure that I will be saying what I have said here today but in
even stronger terms.
Q44 Paddy Tipping: Is
it to do with legal liabilities maybe?
Mr Hewitt: No,
I cannot see that.
Mr Lee: I would
not have said so. In terms of the technical guidance, it should
not be underestimated how technical some of it is; how much more
complicated it is going to get. Let us take an example: so-called
monolithic waste—hazardous waste that comes in a sizable
lump. It is going to depend on a test that might take 60 days
to complete, with some really heavyweight science behind it as
to how rapidly hazardous materials might be leached out of this
block of hazardous waste. There is some heavyweight science behind
it—it does not happen overnight—but, much more importantly
for me, just because the science is tricky behind it, I do not
think I have ever met one single organisation that has all of
the understanding, all of the skills or all of the information
that is needed to make these very complex implementations work.
I think Roger is absolutely right: one of the keys to success
is co-working. The industry has a lot of expertise and information
that needs to be played in; so has the regulator; so has Defra;
so have the waste producers. It would have been much better if
the co-working that has been done through the Hazardous Waste
Forum had been started earlier. I wish it had been started a year
earlier; even better if it had been two years earlier. I have
to tell you, if I ruled the world, I would have liked something
like the Hazardous Waste Forum to have existed in some form maybe
10 years ago to make sure that the inputs of information and the
opportunity to do work between different partners could have been
started at the discussion phase of the Directive rather than the
late stages of its implementation. Let us recognise that that
needs to be done and let us do it as early as possible.
Q45 Paddy Tipping: Are
we making it too difficult? It seems simple to me, disposal of
waste. I do not understand some of the terms you are using, but
this is an area of public policy. We ought to be able to understand
this, ought we not?
Mr Hewitt: I wish
it was simple. I have been working in the industry now for something
like 25 years and it gets more and more complex. Yes, there is
a desire to make things as simple as possible. Simplicity means
that compliance should be relatively straightforward; so it is
something that we should all strive for. Unfortunately, over-simplification
means that people are puzzled as to how the rules operate in their
particular circumstances, what the standards are for their particular
waste. So, try as hard as we all might to keep things as simple
as possible, I think they inevitably become technical and complex,
but it is to a good end.
Q46 David Taylor: Leicestershire
is an area where there is a great deal of road stone, gravel,
clay and coal; and it has produced large number of holes over
the years. We have a direct interest in the Landfill Directive
in terms of reducing the amount that goes to landfill, and, particularly
the area that I want to examine now, driving up the rate of recycling
for biodegradable municipal waste. We were in the converse position
of having the direct disadvantage of so many landfill sites and
yet, as an authority, being so poorly funded that we were not
able to recycle much ourselves. Why do you think there is such
a range of success rates amongst English local authorities in
terms of recycling? You refer to it in your evidence, and the
Government produce statistics frequently on this and they cover
an enormous spectrum.
Mr Murphy: Another
very good question. If we had the answer to that we would solve
many dilemmas. It is a function of many things—investment,
being willing to undertake some of the recycling activities—and
it is true to say that some adjoining authorities are far better
at recycling than others, bizarrely. Perhaps that is through funding
and a political will at an early stage. We do see that there are
some good hotspots of recycling activity amongst local authorities
through investment, through public awareness, which is crucial,
and the history of recycling and feeding that information back
to the public. Coupled with composting and awareness-raising,
this is not only allowing authorities to meet their recycling
targets but also contributing to their biodegradable diversion
from landfill, and we see that the two things are crucial. Unfortunately,
whilst some authorities are at an exponential phase and recycling
large amounts proportionally of their household waste, municipal
waste, they are going to reach that lag phase, and that will compromise
their ability to divert the amounts of biodegradable waste from
landfill to meet their targets.
Q47 David Taylor: Two
of the leading authorities happen to be Midlands' authorities
that I know moderately well, Daventry and Lichfield. I think they
would be described as moderately well to do, leafy, middle-class
areas. Is there a social element to the likely success rates on
recycling? The Government regularly state that they have put an
extra £100 million into providing extra recycling facilities
because some of the very urban areas are finding it extraordinarily
hard to escape from single figure percentages in terms of recycling.
Do you have any tips as to how we can avoid our tips?
Mr Murphy: It certainly
seems to be, to some extent, socially and economically related.
I live in the adjoining authority to Daventry, again another wealthy
authority, but nowhere reaching the recycling targets that has
Daventry reached. There is no reason why they should not do; it
is a matter of political will and investment. It can happen. The
other authority on the other side of Daventry is significantly
below that, but perhaps very differently structured in terms of
its economic capacity. There is no simple answer to this. It is
public awareness raising and public involvement, and the recent
investment into the work of WRAP and the advertising campaign
on the TV should help to do this.
Q48 David Taylor: Education
and cultural change will take a lot longer and carry us well beyond
the expected dates for higher and higher targets for recycling.
We are never going to catch up, are we, on that basis?
Mr Murphy: There
are some serious warning signals at the moment. We can reach the
early figures. With the kind of investment in local authorities
we are getting from Defra, to some extent political will and public
involvement, we can reach the early targets. The latter targets
will be very difficult to reach through that recycling and composting.
Q49 Chairman: Before Mr
Simpson continues our line of questioning, can I ask for a word
of explanation. In your evidence you talk about the "Landfill
Allowances Trading Scheme". What is it and how does it work?
Mr Murphy: It is
a system introduced under the Waste Emissions Trading Act to encourage
local authorities to contribute to the Landfill Directive through
diverting biodegradable waste away from landfill. They have targets
over a period to reduce 35% of biodegradable wastes away from
landfill by 2010, and then there are more stringent targets over
the remaining 10 years. We have seen that the early targets are
achievable through recycling, composting and waste diversion minimisation.
The later targets are that much more difficult. The trading part
is that disposal authorities will receive a credit if they reach
that target early, and they can use that credit in England to
trade. The trading will not take place in Wales, but, in effect,
if they reach the target, they will be able to use that to sell
credits to those authorities that are not reaching their own targets.
Q50 Chairman: The trading
is solely between local authorities?
Mr Murphy: Yes.
Q51 Chairman: I presume
some market place will arise for the trades. Who supervises the
operation of this mechanism?
Mr Murphy: It will
be self-marketing.
Q52 Chairman: Somebody
must be the keeper of the numbers?
Mr Murphy: Yes,
the system will work through waste data flow, which is a piece
of data information which rests with Defra.
Q53 Chairman: So Defra
will have somebody there who has all the numbers coming in, and,
at certain points in time, I presume somebody will say, "Here
is the end of the year. Those of you who have beaten your targets,
here are your credits", and the ones that have not have then
got to go and buy something from the ones who have. Is that the
way it works?
Mr Murphy: That
is right, and the market will be set as the market dictates. The
only stipulation is that the market cannot reach that figure which
would have been the penalty if you do not reach the target of
the Landfill Directive.
Q54 Chairman: It is an
internally driven carrot and stick arrangement to try and encourage
good diversionary practice?
Mr Murphy: Yes.
Q55 Alan Simpson: You
are fairly upbeat about the 2010 target. I suppose if you start
at the Daventry and Lichfield end of things the picture does not
look so bad at all, but at the other end it looks pretty bleak.
The figures for Liverpool 1.9%, Sunderland 2.5%, Barking and Dagenham
2.2%, Bolsover 3.2%, Tower Hamlets 3.4%—that is a lot of
ground to make up by 2010. Do you seriously feel that you have
the basis of such optimism that we are going to meet those 2010
targets?
Mr Murphy: Yes.
It will be incrementally more difficult for the Daventrys and
Lichfields to increase their targets. As I say, they are reaching
that line, but to go from 1.7 to three, four, 5.7 does not take
a great deal of effort. A great deal of political will, perhaps
investment, public understanding and public involvement, but that
is in the early part—that is the exponential part—the
national publicity campaign, localised campaigns and some of this
invested money from Defra, which has been distributed both regionally
and also to those more affluent authorities as well as the less
affluent authorities. It has been specifically related to those
who under-perform as well. I think, yes, the early part, the increase
from 1.7 to two, three, 4.7 is attainable.
Q56 Alan Simpson: But
it is the 35% figure that I am looking at. I understand that the
early stages are the ones where there are often the easiest gains,
but that still leaves a lot of authorities with a long, long shortfall
from that 35% figure by 2010. I have not even got on to the 2013
one yet. I just want to know on what basis you feel optimistic
that the authorities that are so far adrift at the moment could
actually get there by 2010?
Mr Murphy: It is
a function of many things—as I say, the composting,
the home composting, community composting, recycling, and perhaps
alternative technologies, MBT and technologies like this—which
will help bridge that gap. It is not going to be easy, but there
is a willingness and there is an investment, I feel, from Defra
into doing this.
Q57 Alan Simpson: Taking
it on then to the 2013 targets that you feel more sanguine about,
what have we got to do to reach those targets that we are not
doing now? What do we need in government programmes that would
allow us to be serious about not only setting those targets but
hitting the 50% target?
Mr Murphy: It is
the investment in the newer technologies, the technologies which
are being tested now—the pyrolysis classification, NBT plants,
anaerobic digestion—which are alternatives to landfill,
which will treat the other wastes prior to it being disposed of
as some inert material back to landfill. So we have got the established
at home, kerbside recycling and then the new technologies, and
the residual will go to landfill and that gap will be filled by
these new technologies.
Q58 Alan Simpson: Where
are we in those alternative new technologies? You just trailed
a number of them past us, but where are we in practical terms?
If as a Committee we were wanting to look at this on the ground,
is that to be found in Project Integra, which you have mentioned,
in Hampshire?
Mr Murphy: No,
I think I said earlier, we are behind our European partners here.
These are technologies which are used overseas for waste material
and they are new technologies in that they are new to waste materials.
They are in place for other industrial processes, but we are talking
about being new to waste. Defra has a significant programme, a
waste implementation programme, and they are investing a lot into
the new technologies, pilot plants, investments, research, database
and education programmes all linked to these new technologies,
because we need to inform and educate not only that these technologies
are out there but what they can do and how much they cost, their
comparative cost, and then we need to get them in place. There
is still that gap, but there is a lot of work being done on explaining
the value and the input of these projects into an integrated system.
Q59 Alan Simpson: Can
I just push you on that because it is great that Defra is doing
that investment in the research now, but you said that the actual
implementation of alternative treatment technologies is to
be found elsewhere. Are we at the point at which we can say, "Look,
there are X, Y and Z countries who are already putting this into
practice and these are the technologies that are seen to work"?
We do not need to ask Defra to reinvent the wheel on this, but
we need them to put the money into the investment programme. I
am just worried about the lead-through time between now and 2013.
If you are saying that we are just at the research stage, I do
not know whether I am picking it up from your body language, but
would that give us a timescale for investment in implementation
that we have got to have for meeting the 2013 targets?
Mr Murphy: There
is an added impediment in that these facilities would have to
be planned and fit into a planned system.
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