Senior Labour politician, Mary Creagh MP, who is chair of the Environmental Audit Committee today slammed the UK’s PRN/packaging waste system for failing to deliver on a number of fronts.
Her comments came after the publication of a report by the National Audit Office which made a number of observations about the PRN system.
Mary Creagh said the PRN system is open to “fraud and error” – (The MP is pictured at the Recycling Association annual conference earlier this year)
The NAO (see letsrecycle.com story) said that “the system appears to have evolved into a comfortable way for government to meet targets without facing up to the underlying recycling issues. The government has no evidence that the system has encouraged companies to minimise packaging or make it easy to recycle. And it relies on exporting materials to other parts of the world without adequate checks to ensure this material is actually recycled, and without consideration of whether other countries will continue to accept it in the long-term.”
The NAO also concluded that “Despite it now being 20 years since the system was established, the Department does not know what value the system has added nor whether the Agency’s approach to tackling the risks of fraud and error is proportionate. Our overall sense is that over a long period government has allowed the obligations to keep rolling forward without asking the important questions.”
Critical
While Mrs Creagh was highly critical of the PRN system in the wake of the report, others in the waste and recycling sector were less strident in the tone with the Environmental Services Association alert to the fact that some critical interpretations of the report could mean the public losing faith in recycling.
Mrs Creagh, who had requested the National Audit Office, to investigate the PRN systems, claimed it has become a “tick box exercise” rather than delivering “high quality UK recycling”.
“Fraud and error”
The EAC chair said that the report showed “Waste is exported with no guarantee that it will be recycled, producers are not made to pay to recycle their packaging, and the system is open to fraud and error.”
She went on to say: “The government must fix this broken system in its upcoming resources and waste strategy. The PRN system should make producers pay to recycle their packaging, encourage simpler packaging, support the UK recycling industry, and be open and transparent so people can be confident what goes in the recycling bin gets recycled.”
The vast majority of packaging collected for recycling is recycling – ESA
The Environmental Services Association (ESA) said that it welcomed the NAO’s important contribution to improving the PRN system and urged Defra to carefully consider its recommendations.
“No time to lose faith”
Jakob Rindegren, ESA recycling policy advisor remarked: “ESA has been tireless in its efforts to tackle waste crime and we have long called for PRN reform. We wholeheartedly agree with the need for more audits and enforcement of any new system, with robust checks that reported data is accurate.”
Then, Mr Rindegren defended the current system, declaring: “It is worth stressing that the vast majority of packaging collected for recycling is recycled and that this is no time to lose faith in recycling but to step up our efforts to do better, right from the packaging design stage to minimising contamination at the household and demanding recycled content in new packaging. We should absolutely seek to recycle more of our waste here in the UK but lack of domestic capacity means the export market will continue to be important for the foreseeable future, not least for paper and board where quality requirements for material going to China are very strict.”
Categories
Robbie Staniforth, policy manager for the Ecosurety compliance scheme, commented: “The quality of work produced by the NAO is very impressive. In just a few short months they have managed to pick-up on the key issues. We have been concerned for some time about the six revenue reporting categories for exporters and reprocessors. No-one appears to be quite sure what each category means and why the data is collected. It is a bureaucratic exercise for reprocessors without any benefit to producers.
“The risk of fraudulent exports is something we’d like to see tackled in a reformed system.”
Robbie Staniforth
Policy manager, Ecosurety
“We agree that the system has favoured export for low quality material and the Chinese restrictions have brought this issue into close focus. The risk of fraudulent exports is something we’d like to see tackled in a reformed system, not only to improve the system’s integrity, but to enhance the chances of material being reprocessed in the UK.”
And, Mr Staniforth also commented on the role of the Advisory Committee on Packaging (ACP). “It was not surprising to read that the NAO struggled to assess the effectiveness of the ACP. We welcome improvement in the tracking of recommendations to, and responses from, the government. As keen observers, we have been frustrated with delays in releasing meeting minutes over the last few years. The ACP has stepped up in the last year to look beyond day-to-day operational matters. It’s clear they have great potential to guide the government, we would like to see it being fulfilled.”
ACP
Phil Conran, chair of the ACP, said that he thought that the NAO document “is a very fair report. It has identified a number of issues around the way waste is managed and how the Environment Agency enforces compliance. But, I think that notion that we are exporting waste for landfill overseas is a fallacy and it clearly would not make commercial sense to do that.
“With regard to a review of Environment Agency enforcement procedures, this is something I understand that is starting to happen. I am sure Defra will take the NAO report on board as it prepares its Resources and Waste Strategy.”
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Source: letsrecycle.com Packaging
