County Cllr calls on the County Council to “up its game” on recycling

“We need to re-use, re-purpose and re-recycle more!”

County Cllr Julie Gibson, the Labour Group Shadow Cabinet Member for Environment and Climate Change has called for the County Council to stop “talking rubbish” and “up its game” when it comes to recycling. Recently released figures by the Council, for 2021/2022, show statistics on household waste sent for recycling, reuse and composting in the Lancashire area, stood at 41.2%, this was below the North West rate of 45.8%, and the England rate of 42.5% (figs from Household waste recycling municipal waste and fly-tipping published April 2023) and a fall of 3.4% on previous years.

Cllr Gibson said: “Lancashire has, within a generation, undergone a step change in how it deals with household waste. The amount of household waste either recycled or composted stood at 1% in 1990, so there is no doubt that these figures show some encouragement, however when compared with north west and England figures, Lancashire is lagging behind. There was a target originally set when the UK belonged to the EU for the UK to recycle 50% of waste generated by households by 2020. From 2019/20 to 2021/22, no Lancashire authority achieved the target. In 2013/2014 South Ribble achieved a target of 50.5%, however, percentages have largely fallen back since”.

Cllr Gibson said: “Compounding this problem is the fact that waste collection and disposal is split between the two-tier structure of Lancashire, with Borough and District authorities responsible for collection and LCC responsible for disposal. This means many recycling rates are missed as some Boroughs collect weekly and others fortnightly. We will always have a problem of co-ordination unless an agreement can be found on collection and disposal; not only will this help to increase recycling rates it will also help to reduce waste going to landfill. It is interesting to note that those Councils who are doing better across the North West are all combined authorities.

Cllr Gibson said: “The Council’s own Environment and Climate Change Strategy talks of ambitions for a cleaner, greener, healthier county supporting economic growth, health, and prosperity. Yet these figures paint a very different picture. If we are to achieve climate change targets we need to start at the very beginning and take responsibility for our waste; we need to re-use, re-purpose and recycle.