Agenda item

Performance Report

Context:

To seeks Select Committee’s views on a proposal from Waste & Street Services to be given enforcement powers. Below is the draft Cabinet report for Member’s consideration. Comments received from Members will feed into the final draft presented as a Single Member Decision in the New Year.

At the meeting officers will present examples of where we believe these additional tools would be beneficial in achieving the outcomes around local environmental quality and recycling.

          Key Issues:

Additional resource for enforcement for environmental crimes

·         The Council’s functions regarding the environment are extensive, and it has a duty to enforce a wide range of ‘environmental’ legislation. This covers, public health, food safety, housing standards, flytipping, litter and dog fouling.  The Council regards prevention as better than cure, and it offers information and advice to those it regulates and seeks to secure co-operation avoiding enforcement action where possible.

·         Natural Resource Wales deal with the Big Bad and Nasty being very large quantities, organised crime and hazardous materials. At present the delegated powers to take enforcement action against businesses and individuals regarding environmental crimes sits with Environmental Health. Environmental Health Officers have a wide range of duties and public health protection is clearly the priority. They have been very successful with a number of prosecutions in regard to flytipping but the majority of small scale domestic dumpings are not reported as flytipping and therefore not investigated. Dumpings relate to one or two bags deposited close to the property but without regard for collection or proper containment of the waste.  These smaller incidents make up over 90% of all reported waste issues but are rarely investigated and as such no enforcement action is taken.

·         There is a waste enforcement protocol between Environmental Health and Waste Services but this is no longer fit for purpose. The recent changes to service provisions within waste management have highlighted resource issues in taking enforcement action against businesses and individuals that do not comply with waste legislation. Sending several officers to check waste before it can be collected is time consuming and can result in evidence being burnt or added to by the time it is collected.

• At present the powers to serve notices on businesses and individuals that do not comply with Duty of Care legislation are not enforced by any department. There is a growing concern amongst residents that some small sections of the community are not engaging in recycling or complying with waste collection policies and the local community and environment is suffering. Whilst this is a very small section of the community the challenging targets for waste recycling coupled with the budgetary constraints mean that everyone in the community needs to participate positively in sustainable waste management. W&SS provide advice and information regarding waste and recycling but currently have no power to enforce where education, awareness and encouragement fail to engender behavioural change.

Member Scrutiny:

A Member asked the expense of clearing chewing gum and hedge cutting. We were advised that the chewing gum issue would be covered under the new enforcement powers. The cutting of hedges was a Highway issue and the power to enforce would sit with Highways as it falls within the Highways Act. The report refers to enforcement powers under The Environmental Protection Act.

It was asked by a Member why purple and red bags are not allowed to be brought to the waste sites by the general public. An Officer answered that the issue was contamination. We don’t pick up contaminated bags at kerbside and that contaminated bags are stickered, we were finding that people were then bringing the bags to the waste site. When dry recycling was being sent for processing we were incurring extra cost due to the high levels of contamination.

It was asked if Officers would now be able to take people to court. It was answered yes, the plan is to have 8 officers with delegated powers who would have the power to prosecute after training.