Agenda and minutes

Members are asked to declare any disclosable pecuniary or affected interests in respect of any matter to be considered at this meeting.

Any Member with a Disclosable Pecuniary Interest in a matter should withdraw from the meeting when the matter is under consideration and should notify the Democratic Services Officer in attendance that they are withdrawing as they have such an interest. If the Disclosable Pecuniary Interest is not entered on the register of Members interests the Monitoring Officer must be notified of the interest within 28 days.

Any Member with an affected Interest in a matter must disclose the interest to the meeting and must not participate in discussion of the matter or vote on the matter unless granted a dispensation by the Monitoring officer or by the Governance and Audit Committee.  There is no requirement to withdraw from the meeting when the interest is only an affected interest, but the Monitoring Officer should be notified of the interest, if not previously notified of it, within 28 days of the meeting.

There were no declarations of interest.

To approve as a correct record the minutes of the Annual Joint Waste Disposal Board held on 7 July 2017.

RESOLVED that the minutes of the meeting of the Board held on 7 July 2017 be approved as a correct record and signed by the Chairman.

Arising on the minutes, the Board noted that:

·                     The report on performance by other authorities had been produced and was to be circulated to members.

·                     Paul Taylor, the Chief Executive of FCC, was to be invited to the next meeting.

There were no urgent items of business.

To brief the re3 Joint Waste Disposal Board on progress in the delivery of the re3 Joint Waste PFI Contract.

The Board received a progress report updating it on delivery of the re3 Joint Waste PFI contract.  The report covered:

·                     Review of Charging Structure for Non-Household Waste

·                     Increasing the Frequency of Commercial and Commercial-type Vehicle Permit Data Downloads

·                     Monitoring of Frequent Permit Users

·                     Commercial and Commercial-type Vehicle Permits for Taxis

·                     Green Machine Service Level Agreement

·                     Environment Agency Review of Wood Waste

·                     Marketing and Communications Review

The Board was advised that:

•           The changes to the charging structure were intended to simplify the current structure.

•           A software update later in the year was likely to address the delayed updating of information relating to commercial vehicle permits.

•           There had been no instances of taxis bringing in trade waste, so there did not appear to be a need for taxis to have a commercial vehicle permit although the situation would continue to be monitored.

•           The Green machine SLA had been set up to set out what was expected of both parties, in the hope that it would encourage them to do more to promote their service as there was probably a need for more stock turnover.

•           A £750 per tonne flat rate fee for the Green Machine had been proposed.

•           Green Machine’s response to the SLA would be reviewed at the next meeting.

•           There may be a need to separate out different types of wood to remove “contaminated” wood but this could have a positive impact on wood recycling.

•           A market for “clean” wood may emerge making more recyclable.

•           The glass campaign was going well.

•           Although the awards for which bids had been made had been unsuccessful, a further bid could be made in relation to the glass campaign in due course.

Councillor Terry indicated that she would approach the Berkshire Community Development Foundation to see whether they could help promote the Green Machine.

The Board noted that this was to be Anna Fowler’s last meeting before moving to a new job.  The Board asked for its thanks for the work Anna had done to be recorded.  The Board believed the work she had done on communications had had a big impact and they were sorry that she was leaving.  It was recognized that working with three very different councils had posed particular issues but Anna had successfully worked with their communications teams.  The Board was advised that an interim would be in post to cover the glass campaign, in particular, until the permanent replacement started.

RESOLVED that

1          The non-household waste charging structure be amended by:

(a)        Charging for loose waste based on an estimate of 25 litre units;

(b)        The exclusion of plasterboard sheet charges; and,

(c)        The inclusion of descriptions of key terms such as “rubble” and “single items”.

2          There be no requirement for taxis to apply for a commercial vehicle permit although the situation should continue to be monitored.

To consider the following motion:

That pursuant to Regulation 4 of the Local Authorities (Executive Arrangements) (Access to Information) Regulations 2012 and having regard to the public interest, members of the public and press be excluded from the meeting for the consideration of items 7, 8 and 9  which involves the likely disclosure of exempt information under the following category of Schedule 12A of the Local Government Act 1972:

(3) Information relating to the financial or business affairs of any particular person

(including the authority holding that information)

RESOLVED that pursuant to Regulation 4 of the Local Authorities (Executive Arrangements) (Access to Information) Regulations 2012 and having regard to the public interest, members of the public and press be excluded from the meeting for the consideration of items 7, 8 and 9 which involve the likely disclosure of exempt information under the following category of Schedule 12A of the Local Government Act 1972:

(3)        Information relating to the financial or business affairs of any particular person (including the authority holding that information)

To brief the re3 Joint Waste Disposal Board on the options for the processing of food waste in order to inform ongoing discussions on service development.

The Board received and noted a report on the options for the processing of food waste in order to inform on-going discussions on service development.  Further discussions were needed, within and between the individual re3 councils, before a decision could be taken to push ahead with any planning for food waste processing capacity to support the re3 Partnership.  Officers from each of the re3 Councils and the re3 Project Team had met to discuss operational scenarios relating to a food waste service.  The session had focused on cost, practicality and deliverability in both collection and disposal services, the re3 Strategy and the available treatment facilities in the region.

Food waste would require additional or significantly different arrangements to be put in place, not least in relation to the vehicles used in collection and the locations at which receipt and processing of the waste would take place.  However, the aspiration is to ensure that there is capacity to divert food waste away from disposal (most obviously, landfill) by October 2019. 

Oliver Burt advised the Board that the re3 Partnership was in a good position despite not yet processing food waste.  Anna Fowler had done a good job in promoting the avoidance of food waste and this reflected the emphasis in the re3 Strategy on the personal and household impacts of food being wasted.  He anticipated that a the cost of processing food waste by Anaerobic Digestion or In-Vessel Composting which would be considerably cheaper than the cost of sending it to landfill. The cost of collection would need to be addressed, though, and in this regard,  the re3 councils should ultimately aim to establish collection arrangements which work complement one another and do not embed unnecessary cost.

The Board believed that there were still issues regarding “Best before” and “Use by” dates which were not understood by many with the result that food was being thrown away unnecessarily in some cases.  It was, however, recognized that the desire to encourage people not to throw food away unnecessarily needed to be tempered with the reality that there were public health considerations to be taken into account too. 

The Board agreed to discuss the matter further at its next meeting. 

Oliver also circulated a media report on Resource Minister, Dr Thérèse Coffey, announcing that flexibility was needed in how waste and recycling was collected and had suggested that the bins side of WRAP’s consistency programme should not be applicable to all councils. The report also stressed that Government was keen for every council to collect food waste, but recognised that it is most likely to be introduced at or around a convenient juncture in the existing waste collection arrangements. 

To summarise the financial position of the joint waste PFI for the 2017 Annual General Meeting of the Joint Waste Disposal Board.

The Board considered a report summarising the financial position of the joint waste PFI.  The report sought to conclude the management of finances in the 2016/17 year and detailed the emerging position in the current year.  It also presented the first draft of the budget for 2018/19 which was under review by the accountants at each authority.

The Board discussed the proposal to conduct a survey on trade waste facilities.  Whilst there was some concern that this could become a distraction given all the other on-going projects, as the survey would not commit the Board to anything, it was agreed to go ahead as a means of furthering understanding.

The Board also discussed the proposal to increase fees for chargeable non-household waste.  It was advised that, the previous decision not to increase charges meant that the service was no longer recovering its full costs.  More information on the cost of not increasing the charge was requested.  In view of this, it was agreed to review the position with the additional information at the next meeting.

RESOLVED that

1          Market research be undertaken to assess the level of demand for a trade waste service at the Recycling Centres to enable officers to further develop forthcoming proposals in a way which best serves the needs of local businesses and residents.

2          The Non-Household Waste charges be reviewed at the next meeting.

To formalise the approval of the changes to the re3 MRF previously considered by the re3 Joint Waste Disposal Board.

The Board considered a report seeking formal approval for supplementary Works on the re3 Material Recycling Facility.

On 7 July 2017, the Board had indicated its support, subject to receipt of a final business case, for the Works and associated communications, proposed within the Material Recycling Facility. It had been necessary to facilitate approval between Board meetings as demand for appropriate engineers was high.

Subsequent to the approval of the Business Case by members, the contractor had confirmed that it would manage completion of the Works by the end of January 2017, within the previously proposed timescale.

RESOLVED that, the decision to undertake the supplementary Works on the Smallmead Material Recycling Facility be formally endorsed.

Friday 26 January 2018, 11am at Longshot Lane Household Waste Recycling Centre, Bracknell

Friday 27 April 2018, 11am at Wokingham Borough Council

Friday 6 July 2018, 11am (Annual Meeting) at Smallmead Household Waste Recycling, Reading

The Board noted that its next meeting would be held at 11am on Friday 26 January 2018 at the Smallmead Household Waste Recycling Centre in Reading.

At the conclusion of the meeting, Oliver Burt briefly provided the following updates on matters of interest to the Board:

·                     A very positive user satisfaction survey had been received and was circulated to the Board

·                     It was hoped to begin sales of compost from the recycling centres early in 2018.

·                     There re3 Project Team would continue to liaise with the Contractor on the potential  for third-party recycling to be processed at Smallmead.

·                     There was a need to monitor the progress of industry-wide discussions on  the potential for plastic bottle deposit schemes. For local government, and large parts of the waste management industry, the impact of such schemes could be negative – undermining the existing collection schemes and investment in them.  Members asked that a letter be drafted and sent to the appropriate Government Department, indicating the concern of the re3 Partnership about such a development.