PRESS RELEASE: 6th October 2008

Last week Colchester's new coalition Cabinet rescinded the July 2007 Memorandum of Understanding and letter of support for the Essex County Council waste PFI bid and Outline Business Case signed by the previous Tory administration. Defra has been informed.

Colchester objects to huge costs which will cost council taxpayers around £6000 per household. This will restrict future investment into better kerbside separation of recyclables and compostables, sorted at the kerb and baled and composted locally. The prices for recyclate have risen dramatically as global resources become scarce. Our UK reprocessors are asking councils to collect separated clean materials at the kerbside.

Colchester council objects to proposed longterm 28.5 year contracts which will bind councils into supplying potentially recyclable materials to two massive MBT disposal plants at Basildon and Rivenhall Airfield, shredding and drying 'black bag' waste to turn into fuel for a polluting 200,000 tonnes p.a. incinerator at Rivenhall.

The Welsh Assembly proved that 93.3% of household 'waste' is recyclable or compostable. As Cllr Paul Smith said at the Cabinet meeting "Flanders is already recycling 70%".

Ten years ago Colchester councillors led the way when the LibDems and Labour groups first opposed incineration in the Waste Plan after Colchester FoE's first waste conference called 'Is Waste a Burning Issue?'. Colchester led the formation of the Waste Consortium of District Councils who fought the county council at the 1999 Waste Plan inquiry.

The PFI bid, which is waiting for imminent approval from Defra, requires the support of all the district councils and 'broad public support'. Will any of the other councils follow Colchester's lead and stand up against the planned massive MBT plants making fuel for the incinerator which is proposed at Rivenhall but could be on any of the waste sites? Chelmsford has been complaining about the costs but has not pulled out.

PFI waste bids are supposed to have 'broad public support'. But in Essex there has been consistent public opposition to MBT and incineration. We can prove this with 25,500 objections to incineration in the Essex Waste Plan and 76% opposing MBT and incineration in the 2002 War on Waste consultation. 3,500 people signed a petition against the Basildon site and the Basildon Echo newspaper had 5,000 supporting its 'Don't Dump on Basildon' campaign.

The Conservatives were elected to the County Council in a landslide victory in 2001 on a vociferous anti-incineration manifesto. Lord Hanningfield pledged 'no incineration' and promised a referendum if it was proposed. He now says they only oppose 'massburn' incineration of rubbish, not incineration of shredded dried 'black bag' waste turned into polluting fuel pellets called SRF (Solid Recovered Fuel), which is also polluting and even more costly. They both create toxic emissions, toxic ash, massive HGV movements and destroy our valuable recyclable resources for ever.

In the 2002 War on Waste consultation 76% of formal responses objected to all six official MBT/incineration options. 69% supported alternative Option 7, drawn up by campaigners and councillors. Option 7 was included in the 83-page WoW report by the consultant.

Braintree's then Labour council formally supported Option 7, which supports the Zero Waste Charter which Braintree and Chelmsford councils had formally adopted in 2002 when they were Labour and LibDem councils.

Colchester council's new coalition LibDem/Labour/Independent administration opposed the Essex waste strategy when they took control in May this year and adopted 'Option 7'. They also objected to the misleading recent waste consultation which was sent to all Essex homes to elicit support for the waste strategy but did not explain what was being proposed.

Even if Essex only recycled 60% by 2020 they would still be able to comply with the Landfill Directive requirement for a two-thirds reduction of biodegradable waste sent to landfill - such as garden waste, paper, card and foodwaste. Colchester is aiming at much higher recycling levels before 2020 and wants to include food waste collections soon.

Paula Whitney, Waste Co-ordinator, Essex Friends of the Earth,
01206/383123.

Note: We are not 'running out of landfill'. If Essex districts only recycled the promised 60% by 2020 that would leave 280,000 tonnes p.a. to landfill. ECC has extended the current Stanway Bellhouse Pit landfill site at Colchester till 2022.

They also approved - outside the PFI bid - a Cory application for a third MBT plant for 250,000 tonnes p.a. in a huge new quarry across the road called Stanway Hall Quarry. This would include landfilling the 80% residues from the MBT plant - 200,000 tonnes p.a. - for 25 years with normal landfill liners, methane and leachate controls, and a further 12 years of landfilling to fill the void. So we are not short of potential landfill!

Essex County Council has also admitted that waste is not rising now - it only rose by 0.7% p.a. average over the last ten years.