Mr.
Gummer: Will my hon. Friend assure me that the new clause
would enable public-private partnerships in cases in which local
organisations of all sorts might like to join the local council? That
will be a good way for large stores—department stores and the
like—to join the local authority in encouraging such schemes and
perhaps put money into them so that the vouchers are worth that much
more.
Gregory
Barker: Absolutely. My right hon. Friend makes a very good
point. The precedents for this kind of incentive scheme are primarily
in north America and those partnerships are exactly what have happened.
In effect, there have been top-ups in addition to the incremental
savings from the value of the recyclates. Other organisations that wish
to help to encourage recycling, particularly supermarkets and large
retailers, have joined in to help recycle as part of their corporate
social responsibility policies and to help drive the creation of viable
new markets for recyclates.
A
voucher system operator in north America, where a similar scheme
operates, claims that recycling rates rise from single figures to, on
average, 40 per cent. of household waste in the communities where it
has been trialled. Participation in voucher schemes is entirely
voluntary, but in north America it averages at 90 per cent.
in areas where it has been introduced.
11.15
am To
give a specific example, an initial pilot in two neighbourhoods in
Philadelphia included 2,500 households where recycling rates were just
7 per cent. and 30 per cent. respectively. They were two very diverse
metropolitan areas. Within two months, recycling rates had doubled in
both neighbourhoods, and participation rates rose to an incredibly
impressive 90 per cent.
Another
example is from Wilmington, Delaware. Participation in the voucher
scheme is around 90 per cent., and the amount of waste to landfill has
dropped by 40 per cent. This saved the city about $800,000 a year in
landfill costs and landfill tax savings. That $800,000 was after the
costs of rolling out the city-wide
scheme.
Steve
Webb: The hon. Gentleman is citing helpful evidence about
what others have done. Where does he stand on the apparent
inconsistency between what he is saying and what his right hon. Friend
the Member for Penrith and The Border argued? His right hon. Friend
called for standardisation, no pilots without standardisation and so
on, but he is talking about 1,000 flowers blooming. Does he think that
such voucher schemes should be bog-standard, fixed and constrained, or
should they be
varied?
Gregory
Barker: The hon. Gentleman misconstrues what my right hon.
Friend is saying. My right hon. Friend and I speak with one voice. We
do not want to clobber the council tax payer with penalties and fines
in the way that the Liberal Democrats do. We want to offer incentives.
The problem is the incredibly complex array of schemes. The average
community charge payer is more likely to incur one of the Liberal
Democrat fines or penalties if an array of legislation is allowed in.
The
strong difference is not between my right hon. Friend and me, but
between the Liberal Democrats and us. We favour rewarding people who do
the right thing, looking for ways to incentivise communities, and
looking for a positive agenda, rather than the Liberal Democrat
hair-shirt, bang-people-up attitude, or at least their preference for
giving people a fine or a penalty, because it is so much easier,
particularly for lazy-minded councils, just to fix a penalty than to
consider innovation and reward. Of course, although we do not intend to
impose a scheme from the centre, the more uniform it is, the easier it
is to understand, and the more comprehensive, the better. That is
common
sense.
Mr.
Gummer: Will my hon. Friend explain very simply to the
Liberal Democrats that it is helpful to people to have standard
categories, so they know what to save in the right boxes, and it is
helpful then to have as many different ways of encouraging people to do
it in as many different places as possible? That is clear, and even if
the Liberal Democrats do not get it, most of the public
will.
Gregory
Barker: There is no need to tell the Liberal Democrats. My
right hon. Friend has just put it so beautifully that I could not
improve upon it.
Joan
Ruddock: Will the hon. Gentleman clarify his account of
the incentive schemes? Is he saying that there was an increase of 90
per cent. in the amount of material recycled, or that 90 per cent. of
the waste was
recycled?
Gregory
Barker: I am saying not that 90 per cent. was recycled,
but that there was a 90 per cent. participation in the waste recycling
schemes, up from 7 per cent. in one part of the city, and 30 per cent.
in
another.
Joan
Ruddock: Is that what the hon. Gentleman
said?
Gregory
Barker: I am confusing myself. I am saying that
participation rates across the city rose to 90 per cent.,
rather than that 90 per cent. of rubbish was
recycled.
Martin
Horwood: Will the hon. Gentleman give
way?
Gregory
Barker: Let me get to the logical breakpoint in my
argument, then I shall give way. Let us return to the case in point at
Wilmington, where the city faced the daunting dilemma of dwindling
landfill space. It did not wish to fine anyone to increase recycling,
so it used the innovative voucher scheme instead. The head of
Wilmington’s public works, the public works commissioner,
said:
“We’re
not interested in penalties. We’re interested in making it work
and getting people
involved”. That
is exactly how the Conservatives see the recycling
agenda.
Martin
Horwood: I am glad the hon. Gentleman told us that that
was the logical breakpoint. He is indulging in some entertaining
political slapstick, for which he will receive due reward from the
Daily Mail. To bring him back to the facts, is he interested to
know that during the Select Committee’s inquiry into recycling
to which I referred, I supported incentives, not fines? I agree with
his amendment. At the time, that action got me favourable mention in
the Daily
Mail.
Gregory
Barker: Am I surprised that the Liberal Democrats say one
thing in one Committee sitting and say another in a different
Committee? No. That is their standard operating procedure. As for the
savings for United Kingdom recycling operations that would accrue from
not sending household waste to landfill, councils could make
significant savings by avoiding landfill costs.
Mr.
David Chaytor (Bury, North) (Lab): The hon.
Gentleman’s argument about the Wilmington experience is
interesting. There are always dangers in trying to import directly into
the United Kingdom an experiment that took place in the United States.
Does he accept that, if the voucher scheme that he described was linked
entirely with the larger retail businesses, it would further
concentrate the retail market in the hands of the big five supermarkets
in the UK?
The last
thing that most towns in Britain want is a further concentration of
retail share with the big five because that would continue the
hollowing out of our town centres. It would also make individual
households more car dependent because, to use their vouchers,
people would have to drive to the out-of-town
supermarket. What would be saved in emissions and might be saved
through an increase in recycling would be counter-balanced by increased
emissions from having to use the car to drive further to the retail
outlet. What
is there in the Bill to prevent one of the five local authorities from
submitting an innovative bid on exactly those lines? Is anything
blocking
that?
Gregory
Barker: If my right hon. Friend will allow me, I shall
explain. We want it made explicit in the Bill that such action would be
allowed. I do not accept the absolute logic of the assertion of the
hon. Member for Bury,
North.
Mr.
Gummer: Will my hon. Friend help the Committee by
explaining that the Wilmington project was supported not by the local
retailers, but a major beverage manufacturer? The manufacturer wanted
to take such action. It was a sensible thing to do, and the vouchers
could be used at any local shop. That is not the issue. A system can
always be organised. We need the opportunity under the Bill for at
least one of the tests to be undertaken in that
way.
Gregory
Barker: Absolutely. The hon. Member for Bury, North
painted an entirely sensible scenario of everything accruing to
supermarkets, and that would worry us. However, as my right hon. Friend
the Member for Suffolk, Coastal said, food or other manufacturers are
equally able to participate in promoting such a scheme. It would
enhance the opportunity to recover things like glass bottles from
drinks manufacturers and reusable or recyclable packaging products.
Although we do not want to get into that level of detail now, I
understand his point, but I do not consider it to be a necessary or
obvious conclusion that such schemes would put more power into the
hands of the supermarkets, to the detriment of local
traders. Finally,
I return to the landfill tax and the cash savings that would accrue
from recycling within a year to a council that increased the amount it
recycled. The landfill tax stands at £32 a tonne. As was
announced in the 2007 Budget, landfill tax will rise by £8 a
tonne a year until at least 2011, when it will be £48 a tonne.
As we are producing about 28 million tonnes of municipal waste a year,
the opportunity to avoid the costs of sending the waste to landfill,
plus avoiding the costs of paying up to £48 a tonne on landfill
tax represents a significant financial saving for councils. I note that
the Treasury expects to receive £1.1 billion from landfill tax
in
2008-09. Avoiding
such costs should mean that councils are able to pass those savings
directly back to the ratepayers through council tax reductions for
ambitious recyclers, on the basis that council tax payers are already
paying through their council tax to have their waste collected. Any
additional savings that the council make as a result of participating
in such schemes and diverting waste from landfill should at least be
shared with the council tax payers, consistent with our policy that it
is right to reward people for doing the right thing, and to do so
without penalising non-participants.
Steve
Webb: Savings are an important part of the equation. A
local authority does not get money; it just does not face an increase
in a bill that would otherwise be faced. It is not that local
authorities will suddenly have an income stream that they will have to
decide what to do with, but that there is a tax with a ratchet effect
on it, which they may be able to mitigate, to a greater or lesser
extent, by such schemes. Does the hon. Gentleman accept that, although
it sounds great in principle, that is not a pot of money that local
authorities will have? The rate per tonne is going up and up, They can
try and offset it, but the odds are against the net effect being less
landfill usage. The scheme would have to be extraordinary to deliver
that, would it
not?
Gregory
Barker: I understand what the hon. Gentleman is saying,
but any responsible, prudent local authority will have to have a
financial plan that anticipates paying that charge. If councils are
able to beat the financial plan because of the actions of their local
council tax payers, they will achieve a saving on their forecast
budget. That saving should at least in part, if not in full, be shared
with those who are doing the right thing and
recycling. Unfortunately,
I am unable to press new clause 22 to a Division. However, I shall seek
to press new clause 18, to which I spoke on Thursday and which gives
power to local authorities to reduce the amount of tax payable in
relation to household
waste.
Joan
Ruddock: Let me begin by addressing some of the comments
made in the debate this
morning. The
right hon. Member for Suffolk, Coastal accused the Government of not
tackling waste other than household waste, but we put in place
construction-site waste-management plan requirements earlier this year,
which will transform the operation of construction sites. The
Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform strategy on
construction waste was published last
month. The
right hon. Member for Penrith and The Border spoke of how Westminster
deals with its waste, sending it to SELCHP. I cannot comment on the
particular processes of that authority, but I can tell him that there
are perfectly good mechanical arrangements for separating combined, dry
recyclates. Many local authorities across the country satisfactorily
separate plastics, paper, metals and glass, collected together, by
using plants called MRFs—materials recovery facilities. He said
that Westminster sends everything to SELCHP. I cannot comment on the
specifics, but it is the Government’s policy that only residual
waste remaining after the maximum recycling by a local authority should
be sent for incineration. It is true that the SELCHP plant does not
currently have heat recovery, but it is looking at whether it can do
that in the future. I would support that, SELCHP being in my
constituency. 11.30
am The
right hon. Gentleman began by objecting to having these clauses in the
Bill at all, but he has made a meal of
them.
David
Maclean: I took interventions.
Joan
Ruddock: I was glad that he took my interventions because
they helped, I hope, with the case that he was making, or not making.
He spoke about recycling centres and I agree with him that recycling
centres, civic amenity sites—whatever the local authority calls
them—should offer a service that is relevant and fits
contemporary lifestyles. We have encouraged local authorities to
consider carefully the hours at which such facilities are open and how
they enable people conveniently to deposit materials for re-use,
recovery and recycling. I have recently seen a state-of-the art
facility at Reading.
David
Maclean: In that case, will the hon. Lady insist that at
least or possibly three of the five pilots have 7-11 opening
facilities?
Joan
Ruddock: I am sorry to have to tell the right hon.
Gentleman, but that is not relevant to these particular clauses. We are
considering enabling the local authority to recover more recyclates at
the household level. The schemes are to deal with the material that the
householder puts in his or her bin, not what they may or may not be
taking to the civic amenity site. Taking things to the civic amenity
site or the recycling centre is usually done on the basis that what one
cannot put in one’s bin is what one takes to the other place. I
am giving the right hon. Gentleman that information because he makes a
good point, but it is not relevant to these particular clauses or the
amendments proposed to them.
The right
hon. Gentleman queried what is the point of the pilots if they do not
take everything. The point is to increase the participation rate and to
increase the quantity of material that is collected. Although he would
like, and I would join him in this aspiration, local authorities to
collect more and more and more waste streams, none the less it is a
fact that not everyone is participating at the moment and not everyone
is participating to the degree that they might, so we could collect a
great deal more from the doorstep than we do currently.
The right
hon. Gentleman said that he would like standard assertions of what is
recyclable. The waste resources action programme, which the Government
support financially, gives a great deal of advice to local authorities
and to manufacturers and retailers, to try to standardise and reduce
the number of, for example, plastics that are in use—we do not
need the huge range that we have. Virtually everything is recyclable,
and that is the direction that the Government seek to follow.
As I have
said, local authorities provide many other outlets, if required, for
the recyclates that that particular local authority is not collecting,
such as the civic amenity site. Retailers are offering more and more
big containers on site, so that people are not necessarily using making
more car journeys and producing more emissions because they are going
to the supermarket anyway, so it can be done all at the same time. Most
recently, we have introduced “recycle on the go”, to
capture in particular aluminium cans, glass bottles and plastic bottles
when people are away from the home. Much is being done.
The clauses
are about the collection of household waste where the local authority
collects from the doorsteps. The hon. Member for Bexhill and Battle
referred to the Wilmington experiment. I was concerned to hear that it
was a beverage manufacturer—I hope that alcohol was not being
offered.
| 
