Examination of Witnesses (Questions 227-239)
15 DECEMBER 2004
CLLR PAULA
BAKER, MR
DEREK GOODENOUGH
AND MS
ALICE ROBERTS
Q227 Chairman: Ladies and gentlemen,
can I formally open this further evidence session on the Committee's
inquiry into Waste Policy and the Landfill Directive and welcome
the Local Government Association. Before I introduce you, can
I thank you for your formal evidence and also some material which
you provided us with very kindly which helped us in our questioning
of the Minister last week. We have with us Councillor Paula Baker
from Basingstoke & Deane Borough Council and from the Local
Government Association Environment Board, Mr Derek Goodenough,
the waste disposal manager for the Leicestershire County Council—you
will find references around the table from colleagues interested
in Leicestershire matters—and Ms Alice Roberts, the senior
project officer from the LGA. You are all extremely welcome. You
all came along, particularly Alice Roberts, I know you were there
listening to the Minister last week. Did you think the Minister
had got it right or was he being over optimistic about seemingly
saying everything in the garden would be lovely or the targets
had been met, the money is okay or the legislation is entirely
clear, what are all these whinging and moaning people going on
about? What did you think about Mr Morley last week? Who wants
to give us a commentary on that?
Councillor Baker: It might be
easier if we addressed the issues that you have just identified
from our point of view.
Q228 Chairman: That is a very diplomatic
reply, and you are saying that with a big smile on your face which
makes me think that we ought to pursue you a little bit more closely
on the reasons for the smile and your retreat into answering factual
questions. Perhaps I shall not press you too hard, but do give
us a flavour of your observations about the Minister's comments.
At the end of the day you and your members have to deal with the
outcome of Defra's perspective on these matters. Let us start
with recycling targets. The Minister expressed cautious optimism
in spite of the fact that I pointed out to him that he had a huge
amount of material that had to be diverted from landfill, and
at that point he seemed to stutter and not have an answer as to
how we were going to get from where we are now to where we want
to be. Councillor Baker, I have given you plenty of time to consider
how to start and respond to my questions, you fire away.
Councillor Baker: In terms of
diverting from landfill, which is the issue you just mentioned,
we are not overly optimistic. We think there is a huge challenge
there ahead of us. There are some specific issues which we feel
we would love to have in place. I think you mentioned certainty
and clarity, and that is something we feel is very important and
we do not believe we have it.
Q229 Chairman: Tell me in detail as the
operators, if you like, the deliverers of the policy, where are
you uncertain? Because Ministers keep giving all of these very
optimistic replies that everything is going according to plan,
now you are saying there is uncertainty, give me the main areas
of uncertainty.
Councillor Baker: We only received
our targets this year and we are working to put in place systems
that are going to carry us through a long time period. Some local
authorities are in contracts which could well be 25 year contracts.
We are putting recycling schemes in with our local communities
which we need to communicate to them. We need to have them totally
on board and I think we all have the same aspirations about what
we want to be able to achieve. They need certainty and we need
to be able to communicate with them and give them a clear picture
of what it is they are supposed to do so we can be sure we are
delivering materials from waste collection authorities to waste
disposal authorities in all three, volume and type and what the
disposal authorities are expecting, because they have to have
the infrastructure to cope with it.
Q230 Chairman: What is not going to happen
though? You will try and do your best. You made a specific comment,
you said you have got your targets, which targets?
Councillor Baker: Our allowances,
which are only provisional.
Q231 Chairman: This is under the landfill
trading arrangements?
Councillor Baker: Under the Landfill
Directive which we have only received this year. We are talking
in terms of infrastructure that can take years and years to provide
and costs a very large proportion of the funding available to
us in local councils. Therefore, it has to be right and we have
to have financial confidence and regulatory confidence that what
we are putting in place is going to fulfil our needs, meet the
needs of our community and the regulator.
Q232 Chairman: How many requests did
the LGA make to Government to have these targets and information
earlier? How many times did you go to Defra and say "Where
is this information? We know this policy is going to be implemented,
where is it?"
Councillor Baker: I cannot remember
off the top of my head.
Ms Roberts: We have made representations
via networks and via meetings, on and off. I would not be able
to say specifically. Certainly we made a move earlier this year
to publish provisional targets that we calculated ourselves because
we were so concerned that the Government had not issued the allocations.
Q233 Chairman: When do you think the
Government should have given you this information?
Ms Roberts: The Government published
Waste Strategy 2000 some years ago. That set out the outlines,
it took them some years to get the WET Act through the Parliament.
I suppose those would be the reasons why they have not been able
to lay the allocations down. I suspect that what might have happened
was that provisional allocations or a clear indication might have
been given three or four years ago.
Q234 Chairman: Why has Defra been dragging
its feet, in your judgment?
Ms Roberts: I think the answer
to that is the way in which this piece of legislation was transposed,
which was through the WET Act, and that took some time to put
through Parliament, obviously, and that there are matters of accountability.
Government—I imagine in its view—simply cannot say
something which has not been dealt with in the correct parliamentary
processes.
Q235 Chairman: Let us move to the practical
world. In some of the material that you very kindly helped us
with last week to get an overview, what is quite clear is the
amount of municipal waste is continuing to grow and seemingly,
also, we have got a widening gap in terms of landfill diversion.
Given these parameters, what makes you believe you will achieve
eventually the targets that have been set? Is it that it will
happen eventually but albeit on a slower timescale or is it a
question that the targets are in practical terms unachievable,
however long you keep chipping away at it?
Councillor Baker: Waste is growing,
the targets are static, so there is an obvious conclusion that
may lead you to believe we are never going to get there. I think
the issue is all about information about waste growth in order
that we have a much clearer picture of which elements within the
waste stream are growing because how you deal with them needs
to be informed by that information. Also, we need to target support
to the authorities which are most at risk of missing their targets
and most in need of that support. The Local Government Association
has been gathering information and had a project to try and assist
with that targeting. It is a very complex area. We were hopeful
of getting financial support for a particular project, Defra have
offered us some support in kind with it but it is a difficult
task.
Q236 Chairman: Without that project being
completed you are shooting blind?
Councillor Baker: Yes. There is
a risk that whatever support is offered is not going to where
it can do the most good.
Q237 David Taylor: The LGA state in evidence
they are concerned there is a shortfall of funding which remains
a significant obstacle to delivering on targets and you urge that
the Treasury must make proper provision for local authorities
in this area. The Minister in evidence to us very recently talked
in relatively glowing terms, as they tend to, of an additional
£1.5 billion going into the EPCS block. You have argued the
need for a further half a billion or so. Firstly, do you accept
the £1.5 billion figure that he gave us? Secondly, if that
half a billion gap is not bridged, what are the consequences that
you can foresee?
Councillor Baker: We believe there
is still a gap. When you look at the FSS that gives the EPCS block,
we have calculated that is only a two and a half per cent increase
into that block against, as you were saying, increasing waste
growth and an awful lot of other calls on that money. One of the
significant risks as well is that the authorities who most need
to invest in infrastructure, if they foresee that they are having
budget problems coming to them in the future then they may well
take a decision that they cannot afford to invest in the infrastructure
but they need to set the money aside to cope with the eventuality
that they are penalised.
Q238 David Taylor: Did last week's grant
announcement make any significant difference? Councillor
Baker: We calculate it as two and a half per cent across
the EPCS block. You would never expect the local authority to
say it was bad news to get additional funding but we see the gap
as being greater than that.
Q239 David Taylor: I am not sure who
this question is addressed to. When I was on the local bench,
Chairman, you had to declare an interest if someone you knew was
a witness in front of you and you stood down. I know Mr Goodenough,
I have to say that, but I shall not be standing down! We heard
from the Minister that the local authorities pay landfill tax,
but have the money effectively returned to them through the EPCS
block. Do authorities get precisely the same amount back that
they spend in landfill tax? Whatever amounts they do get back,
is it your experience—whoever is going to answer the question—that
authorities passport that money back into waste management which
is the object of the whole exercise or do they divert it elsewhere?
Councillor Baker: I think the
increase in the landfill tax is only a small part of the expenditure
of the authorities' collection and disposal in dealing with waste
management.
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