April news
Somerset Councillor for Frome North (Lib Dem) Learn more
by adamboyden on 21 September, 2012
In April 2011, as people will remember, Conservative-run Somerset County Council’s drastic cuts to their waste and recycling budget forced Somerset Waste Partnership (SWP) to close all recycling centres in Somerset for 2 and a half days a week, bring in new charges for recycling some materials, and to charge for entry to Coleford’s and three other recycling centres. Many people, even Eric Pickles (Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government) criticised the changes as ‘utterly counterproductive’, warning they would lead to more flytipping and less recycling.
I now have information which shows they have been proved right. SWP’s own reports tell us that flytipping across Somerset rose 54% in the year after April 2011, and in Mendip alone there were 300 more incidents (a 20% rise). Materials that are charged for are being flytipped much more – dumping of hardcore (construction/ demolition waste) has trebled, and tyre dumping is up 37%, in a year. Dumping of household rubbish, green waste and electrical/white goods has also gone up.
This is not just a short-term blip (as has been claimed) as flytipping in Mendip is rising fast – Mendip’s own data shows a near 50% rise in incidents up to July/August 2012 compared with the same months in 2010/11.
The appalling mess along Gypsy Lane/Berkley Lane to the north of Frome is also getting worse – it has cost Mendip more this year so far than the whole of 2011,which was bad enough at around £18,000.
Somerset County Council do refund Mendip every month when the cost of clearing flytips is more than the same month in 2010/11, and by my reckoning would have done so during 12 of the last 17 months, including every month this year. This arrangement is surely a clear admission of the impact that the county council’s cuts to the waste disposal and recycling budget have had.
Perhaps even more worrying is the effect on recycling. The amount of materials brought by people to the recycling centres has fallen over a third, by 38,000 tonnes in Somerset. This material has ‘disappeared’, presumably mostly into the bin, and then into landfill (adding to landfill tax costs). Coleford tip was saved from outright closure by a campaign led by local councillors and a vote at Mendip, but has seen an 80% fall in use. Frome tip and others in the district have seen a fall in use of over 30%, with people queuing even longer at peak periods.
The changes brought about by Conservative-run Somerset County Council’s cuts in 2011 have had a clear impact on flytipping and recycling, as they have made it more difficult and expensive for people to recycle waste. At the same time there has been no strategy in place to deal with flytipping effectively, although Mendip has been gearing up to for over a year. This is just very bad policy, bad for the environment and bad for us. As SWP are undertaking a Service Review and will meet in December to discuss the future of the service, now is the time for people to let their councillors know exactly what they think, so that the decision makers can be held responsible.
I and cllr Sam Phripp have put in a motion to Mendip’s full council meeting on Thursday 27th to raise these issues and demand action (see earlier post). Anyone who would like to support our motion can contact me at cllr.boyden@mendip.gov.uk.
2 Comments
Adam
I realise you are a newcomer to Frome but those of us have lived here a little longer can tell you approx when the fly-tipping problem commenced in Gypsy Lane and it was not when SCC made cuts to their recycling centres.If centres were open 24/7 I suspect the problem would persist,however good luck in your campaign to reduce fly-tipping.
Hello Mike, Thanks for this. As a relative newcomer (I moved to Frome in January 2003 – when do I stop being a newcomer!?) and new councillor (since May 2011) it’s good to hear some local knowledge. I think I know what you are referring to there, and agree that the problem on Gypsy Lane/ Berkley Lane is largely green waste/builders waste dumped by rogue/cowboy ‘contractors’. I know this area just outside Frome is under-reported in the official figures for ‘number of incidents’ as it only registers as one or two incidents a month (as it is the number of clearances that are counted), although the cost of clearance is a high proportion of the bill (£18,000 in 2011 was spent clearing this area alone, out of £60,000 for Mendip in total). Interestingly though, approx. two-thirds of the flytipping incidents is household waste, across Mendip and Somerset and the rest of England. So I would argue that reopening household waste recycling sites every day should help reduce flytipping, because closing them 2.5 days a week (and charging for entry at 4 sites in Somerset) led to a 43% increase in flytipping incidents involving household waste across Somerset (11% increase in Mendip) in the year after the changes (see Somerset Waste Board’s June 2012 report), and Mendip’s data now shows the months of April-June 2012 having a 33% higher number of household waste flytips than in 2010. Thanks for the good wishes. I’ll carry on despite the failure to win the motion at Mendip.