Asked by: Dawn Butler (Labour - Brent Central)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps his Department has taken to encourage businesses to (a) improve the recyclability of their products including plastic aluminium laminates and (b) reduce waste sent to landfill.
Answered by Rebecca Pow - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
In our 2018 Resources and Waste Strategy we committed to review and consult on measures such as extended producer responsibility and standards for a number of products, starting with packaging.
In 2019 we consulted on proposals to reform the UK’s current packaging producer responsibility system. Government’s aim through this reform is to reduce the amount of unnecessary and difficult to recycle packaging and increase the amount of packaging that is recycled. Measures being considered to drive increased recycling through the reformed system include requiring producers to fund the full net costs of managing packaging once it becomes waste, setting higher recycling targets on producers and basing producer ‘disposal’ cost fees on the design and recyclability of packaging, making hard to recycle packaging more expensive to use.
We are taking new powers in the Environment Bill to enable us to introduce extended producer responsibility, as well as taking powers in the Bill on resource efficiency to enable government to set minimum standards for products, and to introduce requirements for improved labelling and consumer information focused on, for example, recyclability and recycled content.
We are also taking new powers in the Environment Bill to require waste collectors in England to collect a number of recyclable waste streams from households and businesses. We plan to undertake second consultations on extended producer responsibility for packaging and on consistency in recycling in 2021. Plastic aluminium laminated packaging will be in scope of each. Through achieving outcomes including improving resource efficiency and incentivising the recycling of packaging waste these proposals will contribute to reducing the amount of waste sent to landfill.
In addition, in October 2020 we introduced a statutory permit condition for landfill and incineration permit holders stating they must not accept waste paper, metal, plastic or glass that has been separately collected for the purpose of preparing for re-use or recycling, unless the waste results from the treatment of that material and landfill/ incineration delivers the best environmental outcome, in accordance with the waste hierarchy.
Asked by: Matthew Offord (Conservative - Hendon)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, if he will introduce a statutory duty to extend the range of residential waste collected by local authorities to include aggregates, rubber and household chemicals.
Answered by Rebecca Pow - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
Householders are already able to deposit aggregates, rubber and some household chemicals at Household Waste Recycling Centres. In accordance with the Controlled Waste Regulations 2012, householders can also arrange for collections with their local authority where they want to dispose of items of waste that exceed 25kg or cannot be contained within a receptacle for household waste provided.
We want to increase recycling of waste and reduce what is sent to landfill or energy recovery. We have legislated in the Environment Bill to require separate collection of six recyclable waste streams from households including glass, metal, plastics, paper and card and food and garden waste. We will consult further on these measures in 2021. In the Resources and Waste Strategy the Government committed to investigate extending the role of Household Waste Recycling Centres as necessary to have in place arrangements for the collection of hazardous household waste by 2025. This would be subject to consultation and assessment of potential for new burdens.
Asked by: Catherine West (Labour - Hornsey and Wood Green)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, whether his Department has made an assessment of the potential merits of a capital investment programme to support reuse, repair, remanufacturing, and recycling of scrap steel, glass, paper and card, plastics and biowaste.
Answered by Rebecca Pow - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The Government's Resources and Waste Strategy sets out our intention to move away from the linear 'make, take, use, throw' economic model to a more circular economy, keeping resources in use as long as possible so we extract maximum value from them.
We are investing some £3 billion of grant funding in 24 Private Finance Initiative waste infrastructure projects. Along with disposal of residual waste facilities (such as energy from waste plants), these grants support infrastructure including material recovery, mechanical biological treatment and anaerobic digestion facilities, as well as implementation and expanding kerbside recycling services, which help facilitate improvements in recycling levels.
In addition, £4.7 million of grant funding was announced on 12 June 2019 and made available through WRAP's Resource Action Fund to support new capital infrastructure projects that will help to recycle difficult plastic packaging and textile materials. A further £1 million of grant funding was also announced to provide capital support to increase recycling infrastructure for non-household municipal waste from businesses.
Infrastructure is central to our economic strategy, and the government will shortly publish a National Infrastructure Strategy (NIS) setting out further details on its long-term ambitions, including decarbonisation and levelling up.
The NIS will also formally respond to recommendations, including recommendations on waste, made by the National Infrastructure Commission (NIC) in its National Infrastructure Assessment, which is based on detailed consideration of the UK's long-term infrastructure needs.
The NIC's impartial, expert advice is central to the Government's infrastructure decision-making process. The NIC's work was the catalyst for many of the important spending decisions taken at previous fiscal events. The Government will build on this further when we publish the NIS.
Asked by: Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (Green Party - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask Her Majesty's Government what plans they have to ensure that all TetraPaks used in the UK are appropriately recycled.
Answered by Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park
The Government is committed to increasing the quantity and quality of waste materials that are recycled.
Following support in our 2019 consultation on ‘Consistency in household and business recycling collections in England’, we will introduce legislation through the Environment Bill that will require a core set of recyclable materials (paper and card, plastic, glass, metal, food waste, garden waste) to be collected from households and businesses by all waste collectors in England.
At consultation we also proposed additional materials that could be included into this core set of materials, including food and drink cartons. Food and drink cartons, such as Tetra Pak cartons, are widely collected by local authorities from households across England (60% of authorities offer kerbside collection).
We are currently engaging with the waste sector to develop detailed proposals for collection and recycling of cartons by all local authorities and will consult on these early in 2021.
Asked by: Olivia Blake (Labour - Sheffield, Hallam)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what assessment he has made of the level of additional resources required to ensure that local authorities are able to make arrangements for recycling additional materials from 2023.
Answered by Rebecca Pow - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
In 2019, the Government published its consultation ‘Consistency in Household and Business Recycling Collection in England’ and associated impact assessment. These included assessments of the additional costs arising from measures for greater consistency in recycling collections including the collection of a core set of materials of plastic, glass, paper and card, metal, food and garden waste from households.
The Government will be publishing a second consultation in 2021 which will seek views on further details of consistency in recycling. A further impact assessment will be published alongside it and will include updated assessments of costs for these measures.
In line with guidance on new burdens, the Government has committed to covering the costs of any additional burdens that local authorities face as a result of new statutory duties that require them to implement consistency and will apply that guidance in assessing these costs.
Asked by: Matthew Offord (Conservative - Hendon)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps his Department is taking to improve the consistency of household recycling collections among boroughs in London.
Answered by Rebecca Pow - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The Government is committed to introducing consistency in recycling in all boroughs in England including those in London. The Environment Bill seeks to introduce legislation for a core set of materials (glass, metal, plastic, paper and card, food and garden waste) to be collected for recycling from households, businesses and other organisations such as schools. The Environment Bill does not require garden waste to be collected from businesses and non-domestic premises.
A core set of materials will avoid confusion amongst householders with regard to what can be recycled. This in turn will result in more materials being recycled.
The Government has committed to covering the costs of any additional burdens that local authorities face as a result of new statutory duties that require them to implement consistency.
Asked by: Baroness Jones of Whitchurch (Labour - Life peer)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask Her Majesty's Government whether, as part of their plans to introduce a new Plastic Packaging Tax from April 2022, they will also introduce consistent national guidelines for the recycling of such packaging.
Answered by Lord Goldsmith of Richmond Park
The Government is committed to increasing the amount of packaging collected for recycling. The Environment Bill, which is currently going through the Committee Stage in the House of Commons, includes legislation so that all collectors of waste must collect a core set of materials from households, businesses and other organisations such as schools. The core set of materials will be paper and card, plastic, metal, glass, food and garden waste. The core set will have to be collected separately from residual waste and the dry recyclable materials must not be mixed with food and garden waste. We will consult on the detail of the policy later this year. As stated in the Resources and Waste Strategy, we expect consistency in recycling to be in force from 2023.
Asked by: Sharon Hodgson (Labour - Washington and Sunderland West)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps his Department is taking to support local authorities increase their recycling rates.
Answered by Rebecca Pow - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
The Government is committed to increasing both the quality and quantity of materials collected for recycling and making recycling easier for everyone. The Environment Bill, which has been introduced in Parliament, introduces legislation so that from 2023, all collectors of waste must collect a core set of materials from households, businesses and other organisations such as schools. The core set will be plastic, glass, metal, paper and card, food and garden waste. By collecting the same core set of materials there will be less confusion among householders and others about what they can put in their recycling bins. As a result, the amount of materials that local authorities collect for recycling will increase.
We want to work closely with local authorities to help them improve their recycling performance. We will therefore provide guidance and examples of good practice. We also work with them on developing a framework of non-binding performance indicators to help identify which local authorities require extra support to improve their recycling performance.
Asked by: Caroline Nokes (Conservative - Romsey and Southampton North)
Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, whether he plans to review the 2003 household waste mix model.
Answered by Rebecca Pow - Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
Following our consultation in 2019 on measures to improve consistency in recycling from businesses and households, the Environment Bill published in January 2020 sets out how the Government will legislate to require local authorities to collect recyclable household waste separately from other household waste so that the waste can be recycled or composted. The recyclable household waste to be collected will be metal, paper, glass, plastics, food and garden waste. Together with similar measures to increase recycling from businesses and other organisations, these changes will help to achieve ambitions set out in the Resources and Waste Strategy 2018 to increase the quantity and quality of recyclable material collected for recycling.
Asked by: John Spellar (Labour - Warley)
Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:
To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, what discussions his Department has had with representatives of the paper industry on increasing the use of UK-sourced recycled paper.
Answered by Nadhim Zahawi
The Department regularly meets with representatives of the UK paper industry to discuss issues such as the volume of UK-sourced recycled paper being exported overseas. In 2018, packaging and other recovered papers amounted to nearly 8 million tonnes, of which over 3 million tonnes was consumed by UK mills and nearly 5 million tonnes of material exported for use in other countries.[1]
Our primary aim is to process more waste domestically, including recycled paper. In the Resources and Waste Strategy for England, we committed to exploring options to ensure fair competition for all reprocessors, which will help stimulate private investment in the UK’s reprocessing and recycling infrastructure.
[1] As highlighted by the Confederation of Paper Industries’ report on the economic value of the UK paper-based industries.