…oh dear – NOT going to meet the 2020 targets and waste creation on the rise. It’s one hell of a mess!

CIWM notes the disappointing trend in recycling performance across councils in England, recently released by Defra in the Statistics on Waste Management by Local Authorities in England 2012/13 report. This trend has been evident and commented upon by CIWM over the last couple of years and Defra now admit that this rate of increase is insufficient to meet the 50% EU target by 2020.

CIWM sees this as a direct result of the increasing financial pressures on local government. These are examples of authorities either pulling back from the improvements to waste services (e.g. introducing food waste collection), curtailing existing services (e.g. charging for green waste collection) or reducing their communications programmes. Taken together, the net effect of these spending constraints is showing itself in this loss of momentum in household recycling improvement across England.