Select Committee on Northern Ireland Affairs Sixth Report


2  Leadership by Government

53. One of the most serious and consistent criticisms we heard was the failure of Government to show robust leadership in implementing the Waste Management Strategy.[89] The Department acknowledged this criticism.[90]It was made clear to us that this was a criticism levelled at all Government departments. Bryan Gregory, CBI, summarised the problem succinctly: "The Strategy is led by DOE, and rightly so. Other Departments perceive it to be the responsibility of DOE to implement and do not recognise the part that they can play".[91]

54. The Waste Management Strategy contained fifteen key targets on strategic leadership, but the Waste Management Advisory Board Report shows positive progress has been achieved in only four targets, three of which relate to the establishment and work of the Advisory Board itself.[92] This is a lamentable performance and remedial action must be put in hand at once to ensure substantive progress.

55. The Department of the Environment established a waste management steering group in early 2004 to co-ordinate implementation of its Action Plan, although this should have taken place much earlier.[93] Other Departments appear to have taken little action to date, and this is unacceptable. We look to the Minister for the Environment to set appropriately rigorous milestones for action within Government.

'Green' procurement

56. So-called 'Greening' Government, in which the substantial purchasing power of the public sector is used to achieve environmental gains, was one of the original three key themes identified as necessary to implement the Strategy.[94] To achieve this, Government Departments agreed to develop and implement green purchasing policies. The Southern Waste Management Partnership highlighted the potential benefits: "The introduction of appropriate specifications in the exercising of purchasing decisions and contractual arrangements would stimulate the market for recycling in both services and products, an area where progress needs to be improved."[95]

57. When asked to identify achievements and failures in implementing the Strategy, the Department acknowledged that, among the failures "Greening government was right up there. We were going to green government because it was a good leadership step. I do not think we have done but later on I think we will discover that the latent action is very strong and very positive."[96] The Minister also acknowledged that: "we need to up our game a little bit and look at far more strategic and major Government procurement issues", and she pointed to a Green Procurement Guide, adopted in September 2004, [97] as evidence of "a very good step forward in that direction".[98]

58. Friends of the Earth expressed concern about reliance on 'guidance' and called for a code of practice.[99] In response, the Minister sought to assure us that there would be "very strong monitoring" of the guide over the period of a year, and that "if that is not effective then I think we have to re-evaluate how we ensure that guidance is taken or do something more…".[100] While action is proposed to measure the success of the guidance, it is clear that performance indicators have yet to be developed.[101]

59. We are deeply concerned at the Government failure to provide strong leadership in implementing the Waste Management Strategy. The Minister must address this issue at once, and ensure that all Government Departments are fully aware of their joint responsibility for the successful implementation of the Strategy.

60. The failure to live up fully to its commitment to develop and implement green purchasing policies and practices was a major missed opportunity for the Government to lead by example. The recent issue of a low-key internal guidance note (the Green Procurement Guide) is too little too late, and we believe Northern Ireland cannot afford to wait a further year to judge its impact. We urge the Minister to consider the introduction of a strong code of practice, incorporating clear targets.

Non-municipal waste

61. One of the Strategy's primary targets is to reduce the landfilling of industrial and commercial waste to 85% of 1998 levels by 2005, but a clear strategy for non-municipal waste is lacking. We heard evidence that the Strategy was not considered to have dealt with commercial and industrial wastes adequately. In particular, the CBI considered that the sub-regional plans failed to give sufficient emphasis to non-municipal wastes, and that this position was not sustainable.[102]

62. In addition, the Department recognised that verifying such a target would be difficult because of inadequate data "If we take commercial and industrial waste, we already have a figure for that from a survey from 2002, but we immediately would question that baseline data of 660,000 tonnes simply because it is an extrapolation from questionnaires".[103]

63. Commercial and industrial waste processing is not receiving adequate attention. While the regional BPEO (Best Practicable Environmental Option) exercise may help to identify appropriate treatment options for non-municipal waste, we are concerned that the absence of firm proposals to process such waste places a question mark over the ability of the present arrangements to deliver the infrastructure required at the appropriate time. Poor data is undermining the integrity of targets for non-municipal waste and the Government must take steps now to improve the quality of such data.

64. Responses from the Department also revealed tensions over the way in which targets for commercial and industrial waste might affect Northern Ireland's economic competitiveness. It pointed out that "if we set too high a standard, which is beyond what they would find elsewhere, they may not come unless there was a specific advantage."[104] However, when asked whether there was any firm evidence to suggest that better resource management and better waste management would damage competitiveness, the policy of driving up waste efficiencies to provide industry-wide benefits was clear:

    "The synergy that we have is that by focusing on resource management, by making it better, easier and simpler for the producers of waste to spend less in producing waste and more on the production processes, in other words to make them efficient, we will benefit industry and in benefiting industry with our systems, with our techniques, we will export that expertise."[105]

65. Given the relatively low cost of waste management relative to turnover for most industrial sectors , it remains to be demonstrated whether any increase in such costs would diminish Northern Ireland's attractiveness to inward investors. Furthermore, significant social benefits are likely to flow from improvements by the commercial and industrial sectors in waste management.

66. The establishment and work of the Aggregates Recycling Task Group is a positive development and there is a belief within the industry that this is likely to enhance sustainability. The role of the Central Procurement Directorate in instigating the Task Group has received recognition. The Quarry Products Association Northern Ireland told us: "Various government departments have now signed up to sustainable construction, etc., and although there has been very slow progress to date I think that is going to speed up."[106]

67. The Department for Agriculture and Rural Development (DARD), in conjunction with EHS, is developing an Agricultural Waste Strategy; and the DoE Environmental Policy Group is preparing draft Agricultural Waste Regulations. While DARD recognises the potential impact of bringing agricultural waste under the regime for controlled wastes[107], the pace of these initiatives has been criticised. Friends of the Earth (FOE) attacked the delay in developing the Agricultural Waste Strategy, pointing out that awaiting the introduction of the Agricultural Waste Regulations "was the approach that was committed to about four or five years ago and it was at the strategy review point that the Agricultural Waste Strategy was supposed to be merged." FOE drew a general point from the case of agricultural waste: "… the whole non-emphasis on agricultural waste is symptomatic of how the focus has been for the past four to five years on the municipal waste stream and everything else has been seen as a secondary consideration."[108]

68. We are concerned that non-municipal wastes have not been given the priority they warrant in the sub-regional plans. We recommend that clear consideration should be given to ways in which the relevant facilities can be created. When mechanisms for procuring municipal waste facilities are being developed, consideration must be given to how these can incorporate non-municipal wastes in ways that are attractive to the partners involved.

69. We received no evidence that higher costs in the management of commercial and industrial waste would necessarily undermine the economic competitiveness of Northern Ireland or deter investors. We recommend that the Department of the Environment and Invest Northern Ireland cooperate in the development of a coherent strategy for dealing with such wastes in which the efficiency of energy and materials resource management has a central place. We believe this is necessary if Northern Ireland is to develop expertise in resource management in commerce and industry for future export.

Waste reduction

70. The Waste Management Strategy set out a secondary target to "Stem the increase in waste arisings per household[109], returning to 1998 levels by 2005 and thereafter reduce arisings by 1% every three years". Little, if anything, has been done to achieve this target. In its report on the Interim Needs for Landfill Capacity, EHS projected growth of municipal waste arisings to 2007 at 4% per annum.[110]

71. Local authorities suggested that reductions in the frequency of refuse collection helped to reduce the quantity of municipal waste being collected,[111] and noted other measures in the Republic of Ireland, for example, the plastic bag tax, and charging households directly for waste, which had an impact on the quantity of waste collected there. While the local authorities did not comment on the appropriateness of charging systems for Northern Ireland, the Department considered that "at some stage we have to look at this most carefully to encourage and incentivise people to segregate their waste and to pay attention to the products they buy."[112] We are concerned at the absence of specific measures to reduce the growth of municipal waste. We recommend that the Department undertakes a thorough review of potential measures, including charging.


89   Ev 26 Back

90   Ev 107 Back

91   Q 107 Back

92   Northern Ireland Waste Management Strategy Review Report, Waste Management Advisory Board for Northern Ireland, June 2004 Back

93   Ev 226 Back

94   Ev 100 Back

95   Ev 26 Back

96   Q 274 Back

97   Central Procurement Directorate, Procurement Guidance Note 04/04, Subject: Integrating Environmental Considerations into Public Procurement, DFP 2004 Back

98   QQ 347, 349 Back

99   Q 342 Back

100   Q 347 Back

101   Ev 226 Back

102   Ev 43 Back

103   Q 279 Back

104   Q 275 Back

105   Q 278 Back

106   Q 307 Back

107   Ev 148 Back

108   Q 309 Back

109   The amount of waste produced per household Back

110   EHS Interim Needs for Landfill Capacity, 2003-2007, March 2003. Back

111   QQ 55-56 Back

112   Q 293 Back


 
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Prepared 28 February 2005