Agenda item

1.    That the consultation and discussions that have taken place through the Surrey Waste Partnership and the key messages arising from it be noted.

2.    That it be agreed that combining the function of the Waste Disposal Authority with that of Surrey’s Waste Collection Authorities to deliver waste services via a new co-ownership partnership is essential to deliver public value for Surrey’s residents, and officers be tasked to work with District and Borough Councils to develop detailed proposals which will be implemented from 2017/18, and to report back to Cabinet in autumn 2016.

3.    That it be agreed to work with District and Borough Councils to manage kerbside collected recyclables centrally through a new partnership arrangement and to replace the current recycling credit scheme with a system more suited to the achievement of public value for Surrey residents.

Reasons for Decisions:

The delivery of the Surrey waste strategy through a single co-ownership approach will deliver significant cost savings for Surrey district and borough councils, and the County Council, which are essential in delivering public value to the Surrey taxpayer. The distribution of costs and savings between SCC and individual Waste Collection Authorities will need to be determined through development of detailed proposals which are essential to the delivery of the Council’s financial strategy.

The approvals will provide a mandate for officers to develop proposals and allows for changes to the role of SCC as the Waste Disposal Authority to centralise management of recyclables through new partnership arrangements.

[The decision on this item may be called in by the Economic Prosperity, Environment and Highways Scrutiny Board]

Introducing this report, the Cabinet Member for Environment and Planning said that it built on the Cabinet report of November 2014. He said that the Surrey Waste Partnership had commenced in 2009, when recycling rates were only 40.9% compared to 53.2% now. However, recycling rates had not continued to improve and had stalled in 2015, with the performances of the Boroughs and Districts ranging from 43% - 63%.

He acknowledged the huge amount of work that has already been done and the savings that had been delivered, but said that, in order to get the next level and make even greater savings, the County Council would need to work more closely with Boroughs and Districts.

He confirmed that all Borough and Districts had been visited to discuss the opportunities and proposals to combine the waste collection authority and the waste disposal authority so that significant savings may be achieved.

Savings opportunities from partnership working were set out in the report and indicated potential savings £8 -12m per year, if authorities adopted a co-ownership approach to delivering waste services.

He provided a number of examples of what happens when the County Council, Boroughs and Districts work together, including a single approach to marketing food waste, green waste collected at kerbside by all Boroughs and Districts was combined with green waste from Community Recycling Centres to get better prices and the textile campaign.

He considered that developing a co-ownership approach was key to the strategy and said that currently there were four authorities Elmbridge, Mole Valley, Surrey Heath, Woking plus the County Council who were tendering for a joint collection contract. However, he encouraged all Boroughs and Districts to consider joining.

He confirmed that the Equalities Impact Assessment for the Joint Municipal Waste Management Strategy had been summarised within the report and contained mitigating actions which would be followed in taking the proposals forward.

Finally, he said that there was a considerable amount of work to be completed by officers before a further report came back to Cabinet in the Autumn but it was important that the current system was replaced by a new model that better reflected the total cost of managing waste in Surrey and delivered a public value solution for residents.

The Chairman of the Economic Prosperity, Environment and Highways (EPEH) Board was invited to speak and said that this report had not yet been considered at his Scrutiny Board so he was speaking for himself. He said that he was a member of the Joint Municipal Waste Management Group and acknowledged the difficulty of bringing the function of the Waste Disposal Authority together with Surrey’s Waste Collection Authorities, due to differing contracts and timelines but he supported this approach and hoped that the EPEH Board would support it when it was considered at its next meeting.

Referring to Figure 1 in the report (Recycling rates by Boroughs / District Councils for 2014/15), the Cabinet Member for Adult Social Care, Wellbeing and Independence requested that this data be provided for previous years so that the rates could be compared.

RESOLVED:

1.         That the consultation and discussions that have taken place through the Surrey Waste Partnership and the key messages arising from it be noted.

2.         That it be agreed that combining the function of the Waste Disposal Authority with that of Surrey’s Waste Collection Authorities to deliver waste services via a new co-ownership partnership is essential to deliver public value for Surrey’s residents, and officers be tasked to work with District and Borough Councils to develop detailed proposals which will be implemented from 2017/18, and to report back to Cabinet in autumn 2016.

3.         That it be agreed to work with District and Borough Councils to manage kerbside collected recyclables centrally through a new partnership arrangement and to replace the current recycling credit scheme with a system more suited to the achievement of public value for Surrey residents.

Reasons for Decisions:

The delivery of the Surrey waste strategy through a single co-ownership approach will deliver significant cost savings for Surrey district and borough councils, and the County Council, which are essential in delivering public value to the Surrey taxpayer. The distribution of costs and savings between SCC and individual Waste Collection Authorities will need to be determined through development of detailed proposals which are essential to the delivery of the Council’s financial strategy.

The approvals will provide a mandate for officers to develop proposals and allows for changes to the role of SCC as the Waste Disposal Authority to centralise management of recyclables through new partnership arrangements.