The Challenge Ahead - Councillor Eddy Alcock, Portfolio
Holder for Environment and Waste Management
Suffolk has an excellent waste service. The local Suffolk
Councils have been awarded Beacon Status for having one of the best
waste and recycling services in the Country.
We have met our demanding Government target (PSA 1) to deliver
35% recycling and composting and are already achieving our PSA two
target of 39%.
We have also been successful in bidding for £14 million of
Government money to help deliver our high quality waste
service to Suffolk residents over the last four
years.
We are committed to do all we can to increase
recycling and composting in Suffolk and I would like to thank
you for all your efforts in helping us to achieve our successes so
far.
However, we still have a huge challenge ahead of us.
The Government has set us targets to reduce the amount of
waste we currently send to landfill by 25,500 tonnes in
2009/10 and by 75,000 tonnes in 2012/13.
If we don't meet these targets, we will be fined and we could pay
more in Council Tax to cover increasing disposal
costs. However it is unlikely that such a rise could take
place due to government capping. We may therefore see a reduction
in the breadth of services the Council can deliver.
We must take measures to deal with the residual waste which is left
when we have recycled and composted as much as possible. It
will not be enough just to recycle and compost more as there will
always be some waste leftover.
We have looked at all the available options but some are still new
technologies and would involve taking big risks with council tax
payers money.
We currently favour
Energy from Waste as it is a good environmental choice, is
the cheapest option and we know it can work for Suffolk.
A recent survey conducted on behalf of the Suffolk Waste
Partnership suggests that Suffolk residents also back our preferred
option, with 63% of people surveyed saying they would support
EfW.
What happens next?