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Agenda and minutes

Venue: Committee Suite - County Hall. View directions

Contact: Wendy Simpson, 01392 384383  Email: wendy.simpson@devon.gov.uk

Items
Note No. Item

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11.

Minutes pdf icon PDF 86 KB

Minutes of the meeting held on 28 June 2017, attached

Minutes:

RESOLVED that the minutes of the meeting held on 28 June 2017 be signed as a correct copy.

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12.

Items Requiring Urgent Attention

Items which in the opinion of the Chairman should be considered at the meeting as matters of urgency.

Minutes:

There was no item raised as a matter of urgency.

13.

Chair's Announcements

Minutes:

The Chair made the following announcements, namely:

 

(a) the Committee had received a Quality Award in recognition of the high quality paper collected and supplied;

 

(b) Principal Waste Manager, Annette Dentith, had completed 35 years of service with Devon County Council; and

 

(c) Nominations had now opened for the annual Thank You Awards for Devon Recycling Heroes.

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14.

Waste Statistics 2016/17 pdf icon PDF 589 KB

Report of the Chief Officer for Highways, Infrastructure Development and Waste (HIW/17/73), attached.

Minutes:

The Committee received the Report of the Chief Officer for Highways, Infrastructure and Waste (HIT/17/73) giving an overview of Devon Authorities’ recycling performance for 2016/17, relating to household waste, waste growth and waste arisings.  As Waste Disposal Authority, Devon had achieved its highest ever recycling rate of 55.7%.

 

The Savings Sharing Scheme had now completed its first year and those authorities having signed up so far included Mid Devon, Teignbridge, East Devon and North Devon. 

 

The Chief Officer reported that East Devon District Council was now one of 20 local authorities nationally that had introduced three-weekly collections.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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15.

'Three-weekly Collections - it's not just about frequency'

Presentation by East Devon District Council’s Recycling and Waste Contract Manager.

 

 

Minutes:

The Recycling and Waste Contracts Manager at East Devon District Council gave a presentation on the roll-out of its three-weekly residual collection service to 68,000 households in East Devon, where recycling and food waste was collected on a weekly basis and the residual waste bins moved from a fortnightly collection to once every three weeks.

 

The presentation covered the following, in particular:-

 

·         aiming to increase the range of recyclable material; increase collection capacity, and provision and support for AHP (absorbent hygiene products) to achieve a reduction in residual waste;

 

·         two trial areas were identified in the Colony, Exmouth (terraced properties) and in Feniton (about 1,400 properties);

 

·         face-to-face communication together with a comprehensive media campaign to reassure residents during the trial was extremely beneficial;

 

·         post-trial figures showed that food collection increased by 60%, recyclables increased by 64% and overall there was an increase of 63%;

 

·         the trial having informed the contract tender, a 10 year contract was awarded to Suez;

 

·         service roll-out to the remaining 68,000 households was undertaken in two phases and revealed an 8% decrease overall in residual waste from September 2016; and

 

·         the roll-out was successful and figures showed that the recycling rate had increased from 44% in 2016 to 57% in 2017 (excluding garden waste).

 

In discussion with Members and the Recycling Waste and Contracts Manager, the following points were made:-

 

·         the smooth running of the trial and roll-out was due to good investment and staff resource initially, and doing as much as possible in-house to keep costs down; and

 

·         the trigger for change followed a customer survey that asked for better service and increased recycling.

 

 

 

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16.

Budget Proposals 2018/19 and Progress with Litter pdf icon PDF 177 KB

Report of the Chief Officer for Highways, Infrastructure Development and Waste (HCW/74), attached.

Minutes:

The Committee received the Report of the Chief Officer for Highways, Infrastructure Development and Waste (HIW/17/74) summarising the options for the proposed funding allocations for 2018/19, the new Waste and Recycling Advisors’ contract and bids for the funding of ‘Reuse credits’ and ‘Don’t let Devon go to Waste’ campaign, together with details of the Waste Composition Analysis Contract to which the 2016/17 underspend was allocated.

 

Presentations were given to describe progress and future plans for ‘Don’t let Devon Go to Waste’ and ‘Reuse Credits’ and Teignbridge District Council presented their Pilot Litter Prevention Campaign.

 

Members considered the two options outlined in the Report and discussed the following:-

 

·         Devon was not prepared to fund £5,383 as per Option 1 in the Report, having already provided £3,200 towards the cost of the waste analysis contract;

·         the possibility of funding the shortfall (£2,183) from District Town and Parish Fund (TAP) and/or Members’ locality budgets;

·         reducing the Litter campaign budget to £6,800; and

·         funding from other sources, i.e. fast food chains.

 

It was MOVED by Councillor Wood, SECONDED by Councillor Davis and

 

RESOLVED that funding Option 1 in the Report be adopted as the proposed 2018/19 Devon Authorities Strategic Waste Committee budget, subject to:

 

(a) the budget allocation for the Litter campaign being reduced to £6,800, making a total budget allocation of £182,800; and

 

(b) Devon’s contribution being reduced to £2,183.

 

 

 

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17.

Deposit Return Scheme (Minute 6(c)/28 June 2017

Further to its meeting on 28 June 2017 and Minute 6(c) (The Litter Strategy for England and related issues), work on the implications of a deposit return scheme has progressed further.  A consultant has reported on the potential impact of a Deposit Return Scheme (DRS) on local authorities.  There appear to be many unknowns with both positive and negative impacts on different parties (including Waste Collection Authorities, Waste Disposal Authorities, and the public) which make it hard to reach any conclusions at this stage.  The Government has put out a call for evidence, the results of which will be published in due course.  Given the complexity of the impacts, it is considered that it would be better to wait for these results and further information coming to light so that an informed view can be formed by this Committee.

 

Recommendation:  that a report be presented to this Committee following the publication of the results of the Government call for evidence on a DRS so that an informed view can be formed.

 

Minutes:

The Chief Officer for Highways, Infrastructure Development and Waste reported that work on the implications of a Deposit Return Scheme (DRS) had progressed further.  A consultant had now reported on the potential impact of a DRS on local authorities.  There appeared to be many unknowns with both positive and negative impacts on different parties (including Waste Collection Authorities, Waste Disposal Authorities, and the public) which made it difficult to reach any conclusions.  The Government had put out a call for evidence, the results of which would be published in due course.  Given the complexity of the impacts, it was considered that it would be better to wait for these results and further information coming to light so that an informed view could be made by this Committee.

 

RESOLVED that a report be presented to this Committee following publication of the results of the Government’s call for evidence on a DRS so that an informed view could be made.

 

 

 

 

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18.

Future Meetings

7 February 2018

 

The County Council’s Calendar of meetings is available:

http://democracy.devon.gov.uk/mgCalendarMonthView.aspx?GL=1&bcr=1

 

Minutes:

7 February 2018, 27 June 2018, 31 October 2018 and 6 February 2019.

 

The County Council Calendar of meetings is available on the website:

http://democracy.devon.gov.uk/ieListMeetings.aspx?CId=294&Year=0

 


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