The difficulties affecting local government, and indeed the wider public sector, have been widely reported. Councils are facing a perfect storm: reduced revenues, inflation, skills shortages and ever-rising expectations from their residents. At the same time, central Government is unlikely to provide sufficient funds to bridge the spending gap.
We see these problems every day in our joint venture partnerships, and it is clear that there is a major dilemma for members and officers: how can key services such as household waste collection be maintained to a level which satisfies the local community at the same time as balancing the budget?
Added to all this are incoming new waste regulations, which will undoubtedly affect local authorities’ waste collection operations. There is still a great deal of uncertainty surrounding the specifics, but we do know that the game-changing introduction of separate food waste collections and disposal will happen.
The exact deadlines by which councils must change their current waste collection and processing arrangements are still to be finally set. However, we can be certain that they will inevitably require major reappraisal of both the funding and the operational aspects of waste collection.
This uncertainty means that we are unable to procure vehicles or bins and, once we have clarity, it is unlikely that manufacturers will be able to meet the surge in demand as large numbers of councils place their orders at the same time.
The local government sector is rightly nervous. Perhaps it is time to think the unthinkable in waste collection. There are very few ways left to achieve meaningful savings and, with costs rising so fast, service delivery is set to become even more expensive.
Major savings can be achieved by reducing collection frequencies. At Norse, we have eight local authority partnerships where we provide waste services. In one of them we have done just that, by changing from an alternate week recycling/residual waste collection to a 1-2-3 regime.
This entails weekly food waste, fortnightly recycling and three-weekly residual waste collections. Households are charged for the green waste collection.
As you can imagine, members were extremely nervous about such a change, fearing a backlash from residents, but accepted that this was the best way to achieve meaningful savings. By communicating clearly and openly with their community, the council was able to allay public fears.
Importantly, the transition to the new regime was successfully achieved, with a minimum of teething troubles.
Taking a radical approach, with the support of councils, officers and staff, has led to significant cost savings while ensuring that a high level of service has been consistently maintained. Three years later, local residents are happy with the service, and members highly supportive of the joint venture partnership.
When it comes to household waste and recycling collections, councils will have no choice but to think the unthinkable: changing collection frequencies may be unpalatable, but the choices open to local authorities are very limited.
Originally published on mrw.co.uk on 29th January 2023:
Click below to read a short case study on the switch to a 1-2-3 regime for waste collection:
