Agenda item

The Executive Member for Environment and Sustainability submitted a report for Executive consideration. The purpose of the report was to inform Executive of statutory changes to the household waste collection service, namely:

• Weekly food waste collections service to be implemented from 31st March 2026.
• Fortnightly paper and card recycling collection to be implemented from 31st March 2026.
• Fortnightly microfilm plastics collection to commence from 31st March 2027.

The report also informed Executive of the capital and revenue funding required to implement the statutory services above and the proposed funding mechanisms to provide this.

The Council was required to commence with weekly food waste refuse collections by 31st March 2026. DEFRA had recently distributed capital funding to 251 local authorities. With Middlesbrough initially receiving funding from DEFRA for the purchase of receptacles (which were to be provided to households) and vehicles.

The details of that funding were:

• £930,834 (£127,071 for kitchen caddies, £292,263 for kerbside caddies and £511,500 for vehicles).
• Additional funding of £145,160 was then received from DEFRA (which could be allocated to both caddies and vehicles as required), totalling £1,075,994
• A Transitional Resource Grant had also been received of £343,617 from DEFRA to support the delivery of introducing weekly food waste collections (for container delivery to households, project management, procurement and communications).
• DEFRA had yet to confirm if any additional revenue funding would be provided. To begin implementation, it was assumed that DEFRA expected the Council to use the Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) grant (detailed in paragraph 4.18of the report) to cover any remaining costs.

To meet the statutory food waste collection implementation date of 31st March 2026, the Council had conducted a joint procurement exercise with Redcar and Hartlepool Councils to purchase the required vehicles to ensure best value and timely delivery.

Due to expected timescales for vehicle deliveries the new food waste service would commence implementation from 31 March 2026.

Each household would be provided with the appropriate food waste receptacles (an internal kitchen five litre caddy and an external 23 litre caddy). Larger households would be able to request to order more than one external caddy. It was proposed that the Council would not charge residents for additional and replacement / stolen caddies. It was proposed that the Council would provide bin liners to residents free of charge for the internal caddies for approximately one year.

Members discussed the possibility of greater public awareness on this matter. Members were advised that Environment Education Officers were being recruited to undertake this and that members of the public were free to attend any public information sessions that were taking place in their local communities. In terms of food caddies being resistant to rodents, it was clarified the food caddies were as robust as they could be and were used in other Council areas. It was also stated that increased pest control would help with this issue if the need arose.

OPTIONS

As the Council was statutorily required to comply with the DEFRA legislation no other options were put forward as part of the report.

AGREED that Executive:

1. Notes the statutory changes to the household waste refuse collection service, namely:

·        Weekly food waste collections service to be implemented from 31st March 2026.

·        Fortnightly paper and card recycling collection to be implemented from 31st March 2026.

·        Fortnightly microfilm plastics collection to commence from 31st March 2027.

2. Notes the estimated capital and revenue funding required to implement the statutory services above, and the proposed methods of funding the required costs.

REASONS

The Department for Environment Food & Rural Affairs (DEFRA) had made the following legislative changes mandatory:

• A weekly household food waste collections service to be implemented from 31st March 2026.
• A separate fortnightly household collection service for paper and card to be implemented by 31st March 2026.
• The fortnightly collection of microfilm plastic from households by 31st March 2027.