Waste not want not - States Assembly

Waste has not been an area of
policy priority
4.3 Historically, waste policy has struggled to
compete for resources with other areas of public
expenditure both nationally and locally. Indeed,
environmental issues generally have only really
moved towards the top of the policy agenda
over the past 15-20 years. Even then the focus
has been on problems such as climate change
rather than the challenges posed by waste.
The economic and regulatory
framework has offered few
incentives for waste
minimisation or the
development of alternative
methods of waste
management
4.4 The economic and regulatory framework in
the UK has done comparatively little to
incentivise waste minimisation or to encourage
a move to alternatives to landfill: 39
●
●
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there have been few measures to curb the
growth of waste volumes apart from, for
example the introduction of producer
responsibility measures for packaging targets
following the EU Packaging Directive;
householders have little or no incentive to
minimise or recycle their waste. They pay the
same regardless of the amount of waste they
produce. The costs of waste collection and
disposal are only indirectly passed on to
householders through Council Tax;
despite the introduction of the landfill tax,
landfill has remained a low cost and readily
accessible method of waste disposal. To date
●
the level of landfill tax has been set to reflect
environmental costs of landfill and at too low
a rate either to incentivise industry to
develop more resource efficient means of
production or to encourage local authorities
to use alternatives; 40 and
explicit incentives for recycling have been
limited. Measures such as the payment of
recycling credits for waste collection
authorities, have had only a marginal impact
on the costs of treatment and disposal, and
collection costs have remained unaffected.
Similarly, neither statutory recycling targets
nor measures to promote markets for
recyclates have yet had much impact.
Delivery structures have been
too complex to be effective
4.5 Responsibility for waste is split between
several government departments and agencies:
●
●
●
policy between DEFRA and DTI;
funding between HMT, ODPM and DEFRA;
regulatory responsibility is split between the
Environment Agency (EA) and local
authorities.
4.6 Various stakeholders consulted as part of
this study have argued that the lack of a single
focus for waste policy has caused confusion,
made coherent policy making more difficult,
and made it more difficult to make the case for
waste to be treated as a priority for central
government. A number of stakeholders have
called for the current split of responsibility
between DEFRA and DTI in particular to end. 41
While DEFRA leads on most waste negotiations,
responsibility for responding to some EU Waste
Directives is split between DTI and DEFRA as
both Departments have major interests.
39
there are several reviews of the economic and regulatory framework in the literature. See, for example, Final Report to the National
Resources and Waste Forum, Eunomia Research and Consulting and Julia Hummel, The Legislative Driven Economic Framework
Promoting MSW Recycling in the UK. (2002)
40
Dirk Hazell, ESA, personal communication
41
See for example BIFFA Future Perfect (2002)
BARRIERS TO MORE SUSTAINABLE WASTE MANAGEMENT
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