Joan
Ruddock: I think I need to help the right hon. Gentleman.
The sort of scheme that he envisages would not happen. That is not the
purpose. There is no absolute level of residual waste that a local
authority would deem to be the basis of the scheme. A scheme must be
based on the total residual waste produced within the pilot area. An
average of that would be taken, and the range calculated. There is no
absolute, as he describes. When I speak later, I may be able to
elucidate further, but the sort of proposal that he makes would not be
approved by the Secretary of
State.
David
Maclean: I am delighted to hear that from the hon. Lady,
and I admire her faith in the ability of all our local councils to come
up with schemes that have such integrity. That seems to fly in the face
of some of the stories in the newspapers over the past few
months—not necessarily in the Daily Mail, but perhaps in
The Daily Telegraph. Those stories may have
been totally untrue, but if the stories about some of the schemes that
local councils are imposing are untrue, I would love to hear so.
Experience suggests that some of the stories about local authority
prescription of the type of containers and receptacles that can be used
are, unfortunately,
correct. If
the dustbin man—I am not sure of the politically correct term;
perhaps refuse-recycling collector-person—comes along to a
household and there are 20 different sorts of bins, boxes and
collection receptacles outside, that is not acceptable. My amendment
says that if local authorities prescribe a type of bin, they should not
prescribe a designer-style one, which can be bought only from them, at
exorbitant cost. If it is nicked, blown away in the wind or ends up
being used in the allotment for more convenient purposes, a replacement
has to be bought from the authority, again at exorbitant
cost.
Authorities
should have a more standard-shape receptacle that the elderly can carry
when it is full of bottles and that we cripples can carry when our legs
do not work
properly. I would like to see schemes that are more helpful—I
declare an interest—for the disabled staggering to the garden
gate than schemes with all the different sorts of boxes that we must
have these days, because it seems that our garbage collection people
will no longer come up the garden path to get them. I want to make sure
that the local authorities do not build into their schemes conditions
that are convenient for them, but are dashed near impossible for the
householder in respect of the size, type or cost of the receptacles
that may be
used. Another
part of my amendment proposes that there ought to be no more than three
different types of receptacle. This is not a gross exaggeration by
The Daily Telegraph or others. Across local authority areas
there seem to be totally different rules about what may go into a box.
I agree with the hon. Member for Northavon that the Bill cannot
prescribe the details such as thin or thick cardboard, Tetrapak and
plastic. I do not want our district councils to do so either, as they
are doing at present. There are vast differences in the definition of
cardboard and newspaper between Carlisle city council and Eden district
council. God help us if we put the wrong sort of cardboard in the
cardboard box. It does not get collected and we might get a
penalty.
Steve
Webb: The right hon. Gentleman is over-egging the case.
Unlike ourselves, most people do not live in two local authority areas.
Although we might represent areas that cover different schemes,
provided that local authorities are consistent and clear, before long,
people will know exactly what they are meant to do. Different local
authorities will have different schemes, because they have entered into
different contracts on different dates and so on. As long as residents
are told and it is consistent, why does it matter if different
authorities have different
schemes?
David
Maclean: It matters because there is incredible mobility
around an area. They are all our constituents. If we are all trying to
come up with a proper recycling initiative, let us get as much
standardisation as
possible.
David
Maclean: Because we are trying to move the public and
ourselves on to do more and more recycling, it is incumbent upon us to
make it as simple as possible. The huge difference in the how local
authorities are operating and in their definitions results in the sort
of stories that appear in the Daily Mail and The Daily
Telegraph and cynicism about all the recycling initiatives. Let us
follow the old military term, KISS—keep it simple, stupid. That
applies to me,
especially.
Several
hon. Members
rose—
David
Maclean: I give way to my right hon. Friend the Member for
Suffolk, Coastal
first.
11
am
Mr.
Gummer: As one who does not read either The Daily
Telegraph or the Daily Mail, may I suggest to my right hon.
Friend that there is a much more domestic reason for this? Often,
people go and help their old
relations who happen to live in the next-door area.
I represent the Suffolk coastal area, and many people in mid-Suffolk
come and help their aunts or uncles, or people who need their help, and
they find it confusing that the two places have totally different
arrangements. That is all right for the intelligentsia of the Liberal
Democrat party, but there are many people for whom waste is not the
most important thing in life. To have to go into the kitchen and read
through a list that is totally different from that in another area is
just confusing and off-putting.
David
Maclean: I agree with my right hon. Friend
entirely.
Martin
Horwood (Cheltenham) (LD): Will the right hon. Gentleman
give
way?
David
Maclean: I will give way to the hon. Gentleman in a
second, I just want to elaborate on this point. I accept that different
councils can have different coloured bins, different coloured
receptacles and different days for collection. That is okay, that is
the great diversity of Britain, but it should not be the case that one
authority says, “Ah ha, that cardboard orange juice packet is
acceptable because we deem it to be cardboard,” and another one
says, “You have committed a criminal offence, you’ve put
your orange juice packet from Marks and Spencer into the wrong
box.” It is incumbent on us to make the legislation
straightforward and simple. Given the difficulties of interpretation
that the Committee is finding and the fact that the hon. Gentleman says
we cannot put this into law because we cannot start defining what is a
Tetrapak or polystyrene because it is too difficult and changes all the
time, we will end up in this country with 300 authorities having 300
different definitions of what is acceptable newspaper or
card.
Martin
Horwood: Will the right hon. Gentleman give
way?
David
Maclean: I promise I will give way to the hon. Gentleman,
but please give me a minute to finish this point. As I was saying, it
is acceptable to have differences around the country, but those
differences should be within certain parameters. It should not be
within the parameters for local authorities to so narrowly define
newspaper, card, or material that they will not accept, and to do so
not because it is not recyclable or they cannot do anything with it,
but because they have just entered into a contract with Mr.
Snoggins, who will take only— [Interruption.]. Well in
that case the council should enter into a contract with Mr.
Y, who will take the thicker cardboard or the
newspaper.
Martin
Horwood: Will the right hon. Gentleman give
way?
David
Maclean: I give way to the hon. Gentleman to shut him
up.
Martin
Horwood: The right hon. Gentleman is clearly enjoying
himself. At the risk of encouraging him to go on to a further
diversion, does he accept that the Select Committee on Communities and
Local Government—or the Committee on the Office of the Deputy
Prime Minister as it may have been called when it produced its
report on recycling—clearly endorsed the
approach that each council should be able to make up its own approach
to recycling because the physical environments differ so much? It is
one thing to recycle in a rural area, where people may have four
wheelie bins, but that is not possible in a suburban area, which may
have a box-based system, but even that is not possible in a place that
is dominated by flats or multi-occupancy, where people have to do the
recycling within their own household or share facilities. That is why
we need a diversity of approaches. As my hon. Friend the Member for
Northavon said from a sedentary position, different contracts are
negotiated with suppliers, which have to be done at best value for
local councils and therefore involve different qualities of paper or
qualities of recycling. That is why the approaches have to vary. The
right hon. Member for Suffolk, Coastal said that people might be
confused by different districts having different approaches. The last
time I looked, most households were residing in one district. That may
not be true of Conservative Members, who have such huge gardens that
they cover three districts, but most people do not seem to
move.
David
Maclean: In essence, what the hon. Gentleman is saying is
that the most convenient way for the local authorities and the councils
to recycle will be the way that it is done and sod the constituents,
sod the residents, who will be left with the residual burden. I accept
that local councils may have a different contract to take cardboard or
paper, or the most lucrative recycling contract. That is fair enough,
but we should be making these pilots based around what is most
convenient and best for our constituents, for our householders. What
collects the most material for recycling? What breaks the polystyrene
problem? Some bins now take polystyrene, but the attitude of the
councils has been appalling. They will take the easy stuff:
“Bring us your glass bottles and we will recycle them; put them
into brown, green, yellow containers. Bring us your easy paper, we will
recycle it. Do not bring us your polystyrene as it is too difficult.
You are stuck with that and must sort it out. If it is too big, do not
put it in a big bag as we won’t take
it.” There
is the problem of old mattresses and sofas, which will now pollute the
countryside. If the rules are too tight or it is too difficult for
householders to get rid of the chunks of polystyrene that come with a
new TV or printer, we know where those chunks will end up—in the
fields and hedgerows of my constituency. If people cannot get to the
recycling tip in the cosy hour that it is available, those materials
will be dumped in the countryside.
One of the
amendments suggests that recycling centres in the pilot areas should be
open more—not 24/7, but perhaps 7-11. If someone finishes
unpacking their kit at the weekend after a trip to Ikea or
wherever, by 5 o’clock when they are ready to load the
car with big chunks of card, the tip or recycling centre has already
closed. That is outrageous. If we want innovative ideas, we should
build in rules so that local authorities keep recycling centres open
later in the evening and accept all plastics and materials.
If we have
five innovative recycling pilots, and none take polystyrene and
Tetrapak, what is the point? We cannot get rid of those things at the
moment. I know nothing about the subject, but any fool can recycle
plastic bottles or glass; that is easy. I accept what the hon.
Gentleman says and that we might need different
rules for the countryside and towns. I am happy with
that—we might need different types of boxes and receptacles in
the country and the towns, and in blocks of flats. However,
householders must be able to get rid of all their recyclable material
in those pilot schemes, and not be told that only the easy stuff will
be taken as the rest of the plastics, glass, Tetrapak, polystyrene and
so on cannot be coped with. That means that people are stuck with it
and if they put it into the garbage, the residual waste, it is too
bulky and big and they will be clobbered. Mr.
Gummer: Will my right hon. Friend explain to the Liberal
Democrats the very simple distinction between a different method of
collection due to the nature of the household, which is for the benefit
of the public, and the inability of councils to recognise that unless
there are standard assertions about which materials are collected, we
cannot get the proper value for that material? We get very little value
from many materials because no single council collects enough of that
material to make it worth while. That costs the council, as it will not
deal with its neighbours and make a joint decision as to what the value
and nature of the material should be.
The
Chairman: Order. Before the right hon. Gentleman replies,
I remind the Committee that we had an extensive debate on these
amendments on Thursday, and we are in danger of falling behind. I ask
hon. Members to bear that in mind.
David
Maclean: I am grateful for that advice. If the Government
agreed to withdraw these clauses, we could make very rapid
progress.
My right hon.
Friend is right. The key point I wish to get from the Government is
about those “standardised assertions” of what is
recyclable material. If that could be standardised throughout council
areas, I would not care whether councils insist that they collect glass
on a Saturday morning at 3 o’clock, or that the plastic bin has
to go out on a Friday at 2 pm, although I would like to see that
standardised as well—it seems to be for the convenience of
councils and their operatives rather than householders. We should
standardise the definitions of what can be put in the ruddy box. If the
Minister goes ahead with the pilot schemes, I beg her to make that the
main test. It is not about what size box councils have or what day they
collect it; the main test of the pilots should be whether councils can
standardise their definitions so that we have three recycling boxes at
most that can take most of our recyclable material. We should challenge
the councils to find another operator that will take the difficult
cardboard, glossy paper or Tetrapak
products. I
am fed up of going round the supermarkets, practically with my
magnifying glass, looking at juice packets and seeing that even
Sainsbury’s puts “Not yet ready for recycling” on
them, because it finds them too difficult to recycle. If the
supermarkets and the councils are finding it too difficult or too
expensive, why should our constituents be left with the residual
difficulty of, “We can’t take that, guv, it’s the
wrong material” or “it’s the wrong weight”?
I ask the Minister to try to design the pilot schemes to make it easy
for householders to recycle
and to recycle nearly everything, so that we have
the minimal amount of garbage. Do not base the pilots on an area
average. I
thank my right hon. Friend the Member for Suffolk, Coastal, who informs
me that it was utterly inappropriate to refer to a “garbage
collection man” or a “bin man”, they are domestic
environmental collection operatives. I hope that all our domestic
environmental collection operatives in future will find it easy to do
simple recycling and take away the garbage at least every seven
days.
Gregory
Barker (Bexhill and Battle) (Con): I rise to speak in
favour of new clause 22, which we placed before the Committee but did
not have an opportunity to debate last Thursday. I am mindful of the
revenue-neutrality concerns raised by Committee members when we
discussed the last group of amendments on Thursday. While council tax
reductions have to be paid for, we should remember that a municipality
sending less waste to landfill would be paying less to landfill
operators, which we discussed last week when Members rightly questioned
how incentives would be paid for. The money saved could pay for the
reductions in council tax for ambitious recyclers, and there would be
significant savings from reductions in landfill tax being paid to
Government. However,
in addition to cuts in council tax, there is another way to incentivise
householders without threatening them with a penalty, and that is by
paying people to recycle by offering vouchers depending on the amount
of recycling waste that a family produces. Those vouchers could be
redeemed locally, at supermarkets for example, and would thus go
towards reducing families’ costs of living by helping them to
pay for daily essentials at a time of soaring food costs. Communities
could pool the vouchers to pay for equipment for schools or for the
upkeep of parks and green spaces. That sort of market incentive is far
more exciting and positive than
pay-as-you-throw. The
public will not like the message, “We will fine you if you
don’t go green.” “We will pay you to do it”
is a better and more positive message. The only incentive scheme
allowed under existing legislation is offering council tax reductions
in exchange for producing less landfill waste, although, we would like
that to be more explicit in the Bill. That is why I have tabled new
clause 22, which would legislate for the introduction of
such voucher schemes across
Britain.
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