7.1
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It was moved by Councillor Karen McGowan, and
seconded by Councillor Michelle Cook, that this Council:-
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(a) welcomes
Sheffield’s success in Reducing, Reusing, Recycling and
Recovering household waste, with our achievement of one of the
lowest levels of waste to landfill in the country at a rate of just
0.28% last year;
(b) welcomes the new
recycling service, noting that:
(i) the
removal of the blue box will be welcomed, as it has proven to be
unpopular with local people;
(ii) there is
greater capacity in the new monthly 140 litre blue bin for paper
and card than the old fortnightly blue box collection;
(iii) the new 240-litre
brown bin gives much greater capacity for glass bottles, cans and
plastic bottles to residents who had used the blue box, and a
broadly similar monthly capacity to residents who used the blue
bin;
(iv) that the greater
efficiency for collection vehicles will reduce emissions, and notes
further the innovative trial of electric bin lorries that have been
engineered locally; and
(v) the Council is
maintaining a fortnightly black bin collection and has no plans to
change this;
(c) welcomes the
value for money achieved in the new service, which provides a
£750,000 saving to the waste service, and further notes:
(i) that the
Government’s austerity programme has made an unprecedented
attack on public services since 2010 with local government facing
the heaviest level of cuts;
(ii) the continued
impact of Government cuts and increasing demand for services such
as social care means that the Council has had to make cuts of
around £430 million since 2010; and
(iii) that efficiency and
improvements to services must be welcomed in this context, and no
political group on the Council proposed alternative savings to the
new recycling service in the 2018/19 budget; and
(d) endorses recent
calls by the Local Government Association for manufacturers to take
responsibility for their production of unrecyclable plastics and
work with councils to improve recycling, noting:
(i) that
only a third of plastic supplied to households is currently
recyclable;
(ii) that
manufacturers could change to recyclable plastics or pay for
complex recycling of other materials; and
(iii) that
Sheffield’s Energy Recovery Facility is an excellent resource
in this context, allowing the recovery of energy from unrecyclable
plastics.
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7.2
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Whereupon, it was moved by Councillor Shaffaq
Mohammed, seconded by Councillor Andrew Sangar, as an amendment,
that the Motion now submitted be amended by the deletion of all the
words after the words “That this Council” and the
addition of the following words:-
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(a) notes that in
Sheffield, only 29.6% of household waste was recycled last year,
the worst recycling performance in Yorkshire and ranked 314th out
of 350 in the national recycling league table;
(b) notes that the
current recycling scheme only covers plastic bottles, cans, glass
and paper and excludes all other plastic waste such as food trays
and bottle tops, whereas these items can be recycled in
neighbouring Chesterfield;
(c) notes that in
Watford, a Liberal Democrat-controlled council, they have weekly
black bin and recycling collections and increased their recycling
rate to 43%, significantly higher than the rate in Sheffield;
(d) notes the widespread
public concern about plastic waste following the BBC’s Blue
Planet series and the growing call for local councils to recycle
more types of plastics to reduce the threat to our ecosystem;
(e) believes that,
instead of cutting funding to recycling services, Sheffield City
Council should invest in and expand recycling services to improve
performance and no longer be towards the bottom of the league table
and a national embarrassment;
(f) notes the
Sheffield Liberal Democrats will introduce a ‘Keep Sheffield
Green’ fund where local communities can use the money to
invest in recycling; and
(g) requests the Cabinet Member for Environment and
Streetscene to bring forward proposals
to cover more types of plastic waste in Sheffield’s recycling
service and make it easier for people to recycle their household
waste.
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7.3
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It was then moved by Councillor Martin Phipps,
seconded by Councillor Robert Murphy, as an amendment, that the
Motion now submitted be amended by:-
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1. the
deletion of paragraph (a) and the addition of a new paragraph (a)
as follows:-
(a) notes that:
(i)
Sheffield City Council was most recently ranked 314 out of 350
authorities for “Percentage of household waste sent for
reuse, recycling or composting” as of 2016/17 (last
collective set of data), as derived by letsrecycle.com from the
waste reporting portal WasteDataFlow
which is used by authorities to report waste figures to the
government;
(ii) although in
2017/18 only 0.28% of household waste was sent to landfill, over
two-thirds (67.31%) was sent to the incinerator, with only 32.41%
recycled or composted in this year; and
(iii) notes that CO2
emissions from the incinerator have been growing steadily over the
last decade, contrary to the national trend for reductions in
emissions;
2. the
deletion of sub-paragraphs (b)(i) to
(iii) and the addition of new sub-paragraphs (b)(i) to (iii) as follows:-
(i) welcomes
the trial of electric bin lorries and the introduction of plastic
recycling into flats, something the Green Councillors have long
campaigned for;
(ii) understands,
however, the concerns of residents over where the brown bins will
go;
(iii) notes this is an
overall reduction in the number of litres of recycling capacity
that may be collected;
3. the
deletion of paragraph (c) and the addition of a new paragraph (c)
as follows:-
(c) notes
that:-
(i) to
change the waste services offered to Sheffield would require a
renegotiation of the 35-year Veolia contract, which could be
costly;
(ii) Cabinet
decided to retender the waste contract in January 2017;
(iii) bringing contracts
back in house would give the Council and Sheffield much more
control over the services offered to residents; and
(iv) residents of
Sheffield, including opposition councillors, do not have access to
full information about the Council’s contracts to know
whether the service they are paying for is good value for
money;
4. the
deletion of sub-paragraph (d)(iii) and the addition of
sub-paragraphs (d)(iii) and (iv) as follows:-
(iii) that the Council
will ask officers to research further how it can influence the
packaging used in retail in Sheffield to be recyclable and
sustainable via a policy of incentives, disincentives and/or other
means; and
(iv) that the Council will request the Administration to
fully disclose the Veolia contract to the public and opposition
councillors for improved transparency, accountability and democracy
in allowing others to access information that will facilitate
alternate proposals which can then be considered for the benefit of
Sheffield people.
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7.4
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After contributions from four other Members,
and following a right of reply from Councillor Karen McGowan, the
amendment moved by Councillor Shaffaq Mohammed was put to the vote
and was negatived.
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7.4.1
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(NOTE: Councillors Kaltum
Rivers, Douglas Johnson, Robert Murphy, Martin Phipps and Alison
Teal voted for paragraphs (a), (b), (d), (e) and (g) of the
amendment and abstained from voting on paragraphs (c) and (f) of
the amendment, and asked for this to be recorded.)
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7.5
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The amendment moved by Councillor Martin
Phipps was then put to the vote and was also negatived.
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7.5.1
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(NOTE: Councillors Simon Clement-Jones, Bob Pullin,
Richard Shaw, Mohammed Mahroof, Joe Otten, Colin Ross, Martin
Smith, Roger Davison, Shaffaq Mohammed, Sue Alston, Andrew Sangar,
Cliff Woodcraft, Ian Auckland, Sue Auckland, Steve Ayris, Gail
Smith, David Baker, Penny Baker, Vickie Priestley and Mike Levery
abstained from voting on sub-paragraph (a)(iii) of part 1 and
sub-paragraph (c)(iii) of part 3 of the amendment, and voted for
all remaining paragraphs and parts of the amendment,
and asked for this to be recorded.)
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7.6
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The original Motion was then
put to the vote and carried as follows:-
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RESOLVED: That this
Council:-
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(a) welcomes
Sheffield’s success in Reducing, Reusing, Recycling and
Recovering household waste, with our achievement of one of the
lowest levels of waste to landfill in the country at a rate of just
0.28% last year;
(b) welcomes the
new recycling service, noting that:
(i) the
removal of the blue box will be welcomed, as it has proven to be
unpopular with local people;
(ii) there is
greater capacity in the new monthly 140 litre blue bin for paper
and card than the old fortnightly blue box collection;
(iii) the new 240-litre
brown bin gives much greater capacity for glass bottles, cans and
plastic bottles to residents who had used the blue box, and a
broadly similar monthly capacity to residents who used the blue
bin;
(iv) that the greater
efficiency for collection vehicles will reduce emissions, and notes
further the innovative trial of electric bin lorries that have been
engineered locally; and
(v) the Council is
maintaining a fortnightly black bin collection and has no plans to
change this;
(c)
welcomes the value for money achieved in the new service, which
provides a £750,000 saving to the waste service, and further
notes:
(i) that the
Government’s austerity programme has made an unprecedented
attack on public services since 2010 with local government facing
the heaviest level of cuts;
(ii) the continued
impact of Government cuts and increasing demand for services such
as social care means that the Council has had to make cuts of
around £430 million since 2010; and
(iii) that efficiency and
improvements to services must be welcomed in this context, and no
political group on the Council proposed alternative savings to the
new recycling service in the 2018/19 budget; and
(d) endorses
recent calls by the Local Government Association for manufacturers
to take responsibility for their production of unrecyclable
plastics and work with councils to improve recycling, noting:
(i) that
only a third of plastic supplied to households is currently
recyclable;
(ii) that
manufacturers could change to recyclable plastics or pay for
complex recycling of other materials; and
(iii) that Sheffield’s Energy Recovery Facility is
an excellent resource in this context, allowing the recovery of
energy from unrecyclable plastics.
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7.6.1
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(NOTE: 1. Councillors Simon
Clement-Jones, Bob Pullin, Richard Shaw, Mohammed Mahroof, Joe
Otten, Colin Ross, Martin Smith, Roger Davison, Shaffaq Mohammed,
Sue Alston, Andrew Sangar, Cliff Woodcraft, Ian Auckland, Sue
Auckland, Steve Ayris, Gail Smith, David Baker, Penny Baker, Vickie
Priestley and Mike Levery voted for sub-paragraph (b)(v) and
paragraph (d) of the Motion, voted against paragraph (a),
sub-paragraphs (b)(i)-(iii) and
paragraph (c) of the Motion, and abstained from voting on
sub-paragraph (b)(iv) of the Motion, and asked for
this to be recorded;
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2. Councillors Kaltum Rivers,
Douglas Johnson, Robert Murphy, Martin Phipps and Alison Teal voted
for sub-paragraphs (d)(i) and (ii) and
voted against paragraphs (a), (b), (c) and sub-paragraph (d)(iii)
of the Motion, and asked for
this to be recorded; and
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3. Councillors Keith Davis and
John Booker voted for paragraphs (a), (b), sub-paragraphs
(c)(i) and
(ii) and paragraph (d) of the Motion and voted against
sub-paragraph (c)(iii) of the Motion, and
asked for this to be recorded.)
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