Agenda item

Councillor Mark Howell, Portfolio Holder for Environmental Services, drew Council’s attention to the recent Cabinet decision to change the South Cambridgeshire Recycling Service so that all recycling would be collected in the blue bin, bringing to an end the separate collection of paper in a caddy box.  Councillor Howell explained the rationale, details of which were set out in the report circulated with the Council agenda.

Council’s views were sought on the best way of communicating these changes to residents and communities in order to ensure a smooth and effective service transition.  A summary of the comments made is set out below:

·                Councillor John Batchelor commented on the need to inform residents about this as a matter of urgency as he suspected the changes were already being implemented.  His caddy had been taken away earlier that week without notice and when he enquired about it he was told he wasn’t going to get another one.

·                Councillor Douglas de Lacey expressed disquiet about the last paragraph of the report [page 24 of the agenda pack] which stated that co-mingling may lead to reduced quality of recyclates, however close working with resident and MAF should be able to ensure material quality.  He was not sure what was meant by close working with residents but he could not imagine waste staff would have time to talk to residents and go through their bins to explain what they shouldn’t have recycled.  He was concerned that ‘may lead’ would almost certainly become ‘will lead’.  Communication was the key and Councillor de Lacey echoed Councillor Batchelor’s comments about this needing to be done quickly and properly.  Girton, had been part of the trial and was already managing without caddies.  Councillor de Lacey commented that the way the changes had been introduced there had been absolutely appalling as a result of confusing and contradictory communications.  The Council’s response to complaints from residents about caddies which had been removed without notice was to arrange delivery of a replacement caddy; which they could not use.  This was a gross waste of resources.  He asked that this time Council departments communicated with each other before it worried about communication with the wider public.

·                Councillor Aidan Van de Weyer confirmed that he and many other Members had spoken to parish councils about the planned change and had included information on this in their reports.  He suggested that it would be helpful if officers could provide a form of words or image that could be submitted for inclusion in parish magazines and other relevant publications.  It would be extremely helpful if this could include an explanation of why the changes were being made, as his experience had been that when this was explained to the parish councils they were much more receptive to it. 

·                Councillor Sue Ellington asked whether there would continue to be communal bins in car parks and other central places where people could dispose of paper. 

·                Councillor Graham Cone asked what residents could do with the caddies once they were no longer in use.  Would they be collected or would they be left to dispose of them themselves if they no longer required them?  On a related matter, Councillor Janet Lockwood asked whether the caddies would end up going to landfill.  She commented that not all residents would want to keep and use their caddies and suggested that residents should be advised that if they no longer wanted their caddy they should put them in the blue bin.

·                Councillor Ruth Betson asked if it was possible to provide some text suitable for use on social media.  She commented that she supported the change and asked how many parishes had already adopted the new arrangements and did not use caddies.

·                Councillor Tumi Hawkins stated that having schooled her kids to put all paper in the caddy to get the most out of it, she was disappointed that we were doing away with it. 

·                Councillor Deborah Roberts was concerned that the Council should not solely rely on parish newsletters to inform residents about the change.  She suggested some parish councils might be willing to deliver leaflets if they were provided, but stressed that it was unreasonable to expect them to finance, produce and deliver information about something that was this Council’s responsibility. 

Councillor Howell thanked everyone for their input and acknowledged the need to get on with the communication process as soon as possible.  He explained that Cambourne, Girton and Oakington had participated in the trial and apologised to Councillor de Lacey that in some cases things had clearly not gone as well as they should have.  Councillor Howell welcomed suggestions about providing standard text for publication and social media and would take this on board.  With reference to parish councils, he acknowledged Councillor Roberts’ comments.  The plan was for leaflets to be left with every bin explaining the changes.

Councillor Howell confirmed that communal bins would remain in car parks and other sites for at least a year.  Separate collection would also continue to take place from the underground bins provided at the new development in North West Cambridge as this had formed part of the agreement with the University.  With reference to caddies, he stressed that it was not possible to recycle the caddies because they were hard plastic and if a significant number of households opted to do this it would result in exceeding the contamination rate at the depot.  Residents were being asked to use them or take them to the recycling centre where there was a hard plastic recycling facility.