LOCAL REPRESENTATIVES were talking rubbish at this month’s meeting of Wexford County Council. In the literal sense, that is.
Following a detailed presentation on the draft Southern Regional Waste Management Plan 2015 – 2021, that was delivered by regional waste co-ordinator Philippa King, a lengthy debate on the issue of household and commercial waste ensued.
The proposal for achieving improved targets in the field of effective waste management is not confined to County Wexford and will impact on 1.5 million people under the jurisdiction of ten separate local authorities within the southern region.
However, Wexford County Councillors were intent on keeping the focus of the discussion on local issues arising.
The overall performance targets included in the detailed submission centre on three key objectives; reducing household waste, increasing recycling and reducing the level of waste entering landfill sites.
Ms King explained that it is hoped that a 1% reduction per annum in the quantity of household waste will be generated per capita over the period of the plan.
The regional co-ordinator continued that within recycling activity the planned target is to achieve a rate of 50% within the municipal waste prepared for reuse and recycling.
She also noted that it is intended to reduce to 0% the direct disposal of unprocessed residual municipal waste to landfill (from 2016 onwards) in favour of higher value pre-treatment processes and indigenous recovery practices.
It was also revealed that the latest statistics indicate that 72% of households within County Wexford are signed up to a waste collection service, which is slightly above the national average of 70%.
Local authority officials expressed their satisfaction at this figure as it is significantly higher than neighbouring south east counties.
Kilkenny has a rate of just 54% signed up to collection services; meanwhile the figure stands at 66% in Carlow.
However, a number of local representatives expressed their own bitter dissatisfaction with the 28% of householders who have not committed to a structured waste disposal service, with the implication that those guilty of fly dumping are presumably within this group.
Labour councillor for the Gorey District Robbie Ireton launched an attack on the one-quarter of Wexford’s residents who have not signed up.
“Where are these people who have no bins getting rid of their rubbish? Surely there is enough people unemployed that we can employ people to go into housing estates and ask people ‘have you go a bin?’” Cllr Ireton stated.
Cathoirleach Fianna Fail councillor Malcolm Byrne added to this suggestion that perhaps staff from the council’s Franchise Department who are already tasked with calling door to door to update the register of electors could be asked to retrieve data on refuse collections services from constituents also.
This was, however, shot down by Director of Services John Carley who indicated that it is currently a struggle to simply “get people to answer their doors” without adding an extra obstacle to the work of council officials.
Bunclody councillor Barbara Ann Murphy added her condemnation for the culprits of littering.
The Fianna Fail representative noted that she keeps a roll of black bags and a pair of rubber gloves in the boot of her car for the occasions when she spots sacks of refuse waste dumped on the side of the road.
Meanwhile, her party colleague Cllr Michael Whelan mooted the suggestion that the local authority should make it a requirement that all of its own local authority tenants should have to declare evidence of a waste collection service.
Enniscorthy’s Cllr Keith Doyle recalled that in the past the town’s district council had sent out a letter to its tenants requesting evidence of such collections.
Cllr Doyle noted that while the circulation did prompt a negative reaction from many householders, it also generated a surge in the interest in local waste collections and saw a sharp increase in the number of tenants signing up.
People before Profit’s Cllr Deirdre Wadding expressed a degree of concern at the suggestion that signing up for a collection service might become a legal requirement.
Cllr Wadding explained that she herself was not signed up to a contract because in the past her late father had permitted her to dispose of her household waste in his bin, which she claimed was never full as he was living alone.
She stressed that any such changes to the regulations would need to include a provision for individuals to illustrate cases of this nature to the local authority.
The debate concluded after ms King noted that there was no immediate impetus to take this course of action, however in the coming months a set of questions relating to waste disposal will be included in the quarterly household survey.
Officials will take note of the statistics derived from this method of information recovery before any changes are implemented to current regulations.