Zero Waste Plan
The next item of business is a debate on motion S3M-6275, in the name of Richard Lochhead, on the forthcoming zero waste plan. I draw members’ attention to the fact that a corrected version of Elaine Murray’s amendment has been made available at the back of the chamber.
15:20
I am delighted to open this afternoon’s debate on waste in Scotland, which I am sure all members will agree is an event of equal importance to anything else that might be happening in the United Kingdom at the current time.
Members will recall that we launched a major public consultation last summer on proposals for a zero waste plan for Scotland. I promised then to come back to Parliament after the consultation to give members a further opportunity to express their views on the key issues that they would like the plan to address. This afternoon’s debate, albeit that it is a brief one, delivers on that promise.
The public consultation was a resounding success. It attracted nearly 250 responses from councils, businesses, third sector bodies, individuals and many others. It is clear that the people of Scotland really care about waste and want to make a difference. I am confident that, in developing our policy proposals, we will take into account many of the key points that were raised.
In addition to the public consultation, I was pleased recently to see the views of key stakeholders—which I am sure we have all received—including those of the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities and WWF Scotland. We broadly agree with the majority of the points that those organisations made. I am keen to hear members’ views today, before we finalise our proposals for the zero waste plan. I am confident that there is a broad consensus on how we can move forward together to achieve our goal of a zero waste Scotland.
Waste is part of all our lives, and the figures are sobering. In 2008, we produced almost 20 million tonnes of waste from households, industry, business and all parts of society, and our councils spend about £400 million of public money each year on collecting and treating waste. As WWF Scotland states in its briefing for the debate, if we keep consuming the earth’s resources at the current rate, we will need more than one planet to survive. Clearly, that is not sustainable.
The nation is beginning to get the message on waste and efficient use of resources. The amount of waste that is thrown out by households is falling steadily and the quantities that we recycle have risen dramatically. On average, councils are already recycling more than 35 per cent of the waste that they collect, and the best-performing councils recycle as much as 45 per cent. Some councils still have some way to go. However, the nation could be said to have picked the low-hanging fruit on recycling. We all have a growing recognition that, from now on, every step will be more and more challenging.
We have made encouraging progress since devolution, but it will be a lot tougher to make an equivalent leap forward in the next 10 or 15 years, and anyone who pretends that it will be easy is kidding themselves. However, we must continue to move towards a zero waste society, which is why we hope to publish within the next few weeks our zero waste plan for a Scotland where waste is reduced to a minimum and all resources are used as effectively and efficiently as possible.
We have already taken a number of important steps in recent years and months. We are working closely with local authorities to encourage them to continue to increase their recycling rates and we have set up a single co-ordinated zero waste Scotland programme to support businesses, local authorities and individuals more effectively. Up to now, the public and the business community have had to deal with too many public sector organisations—that point was well made by the Federation of Small Businesses only this week. We have also passed ground-breaking legislation to address the climate impacts of waste. However, we have more to do in order to understand better the carbon cost of Scotland’s waste. Again, we will have to work on that in the years ahead.
Our proposals build directly on the responses to the consultation. I hope that we will reach agreement on the issues so we can map out a clear future for waste and the use of resources in Scotland, and unlock the big decisions and investments that will be needed in the times ahead.
Zero waste means thinking not simply about waste, but about resources. We need to recognise and preserve the economic and environmental value of all the resources that we use in this country by, for example, preventing waste in the first place, by reusing materials, by recycling resources or by recovering the value of these things in some other way. Disposal must be our last resort and should be used only if no other option is available.
Although previous waste policies have focused on the waste that is collected by councils from our doorsteps and local businesses, the fact is that household waste represents less than one fifth of all the waste that is generated in Scotland each year. The construction and demolition industry produces over 40 per cent of all waste, while the rest of the commercial and industrial sector accounts for another 40 per cent. If we are serious about reducing waste and using resources better, we need to look at all of Scotland’s waste. I know that that view is shared by many people in the chamber and beyond.
To achieve those goals, we need the right systems and infrastructure to collect, sort and treat all the resources that we currently treat as waste, and local authorities and the waste management sector need to invest in systems to separate materials and recover their value. Of course, that will provide many economic opportunities.
A top priority for any waste policy must be a reduction in the amount of valuable resources that are sent to landfill. The landfill tax is already making the option increasingly expensive and we believe that it is now time to consider legislation to ban certain materials altogether from being sent to landfill if they can be reused, recycled or recovered. Such an approach was widely supported in the consultation.
It would make sense, for instance, to ban landfill of biodegradable wastes such as food and garden waste. Although such waste is responsible for significant greenhouse gas emissions from landfill, it can be treated to recover its energy value. Again, that approach has a lot of support. Indeed, I note that the three main United Kingdom parties had similar commitments in their recent manifestos. In an effort to support that approach to landfill bans, we need to consider whether different materials should be separated as early as possible in the process to avoid cross-contamination and other problems.
Food waste is a major part of the equation. Scotland currently produces over 2 million tonnes of food waste a year, which is a waste not only of good precious food, but of money. Although, in tackling issues such as food waste, we should remember that the problem will always be with us to some extent, we nevertheless have to collect some of this waste separately to get back as much value as possible.
Zero waste means recovering the maximum value from resources that were previously treated as waste. Again, there will always be some waste that cannot be reused or recycled; in such cases, recovering its energy content will be the best option. As we will all accept, there are concerns about how energy from waste is used. Our present policy is based on capping at 25 per cent of all the waste that local authorities manage, the amount of waste that they can treat by energy from waste through incineration. However, we are considering a new approach. After all, the cap applies only to 4 per cent of all waste in Scotland: if we are aiming to tackle all waste in Scotland, our energy-from-waste policy should have the same aim. As a result, we feel that legislating on the materials that can be used in energy-from-waste plants would be a much better way of regulating things and would allow us to emphasise that we are focusing on all waste in Scotland, and not just on the municipal waste that local authorities collect.
I could go on about all the—
Will the member give way?
I am in the hands of the Presiding Officer.
You must be very brief, Ms Smith.
I am simply keen to hear the cabinet secretary’s comments about using energy from waste to benefit communities.
Many members and organisations such as the Sustainable Development Commission and the Scottish Environment Protection Agency agree that energy from waste has a role in that respect. The approach has been adopted in other countries and, indeed, in the UK election campaign a number of parties were calling for a huge increase in the use of energy from waste in England and Wales. Of course, if any applications for such plants are submitted in any part of Scotland, the planning process will need to take into account local authorities’ views.
I will conclude, because I am well over my time. We have moved a long way in Scotland on this issue, and we must pay tribute to the Scottish public for upping recycling rates since devolution. That said, there is still a long way to go. We as a society must continue to change our behaviour if we are to protect our environment and manage Scotland’s waste more effectively. We must see waste not as a problem but as one of the planet’s valuable resources. If we work together and build on the zero waste plan, which we will launch in the next couple of weeks, we can take Scotland down the road towards being a zero waste society.
I move,
That the Parliament notes the need for a coherent zero-waste policy approach to encourage waste prevention and efficient use of all resources; supports measures to increase recycling and deliver high-quality recycled materials, to ensure resources are recovered and treated in the most environmentally beneficial way and to minimise the disposal of resources into landfill, and looks to the forthcoming Zero Waste Plan for Scotland to provide clear long-term policy stability for the necessary investment to deliver a zero-waste Scotland.
15:29
I am, of course, pleased to see progress being made towards a zero waste plan. The history of the development of the plan shows that the cabinet secretary announced a review of the national waste strategy in a statement to the chamber in January 2008. We had another debate on the national waste strategy on 11 June last year, before the consultation document was launched. During that debate, we were invited to present our views on what should be in the consultation document. Eleven months later, we are having another debate, which is our final opportunity to influence the plan that will be published in a few weeks’ time. It has taken some time to be produced, so I hope that it will be of good quality.
The European revised water framework directive must be transposed into Scots law by 12 December this year. It is regrettable that the development of the plan has taken so long. To be honest, I would have preferred to have seen the plan and debated how it will be implemented. I doubt that any radical changes will be made as a result of this debate, although I expect that there will be general agreement on the principles and the way forward.
To be positive, I welcome the creation of a single Scottish programme under zero waste Scotland to deliver the zero waste plan. A similar approach was taken by the previous United Kingdom Government, which gave the Waste and Resources Action Programme responsibility as the overarching delivery body for business and household waste management. There are many players in waste management, and the creation of a single programme is a sensible move that will foster the coherence to which the Government’s motion refers.
The Labour Party’s amendment refers to the concerns that were expressed in Audit Scotland’s report, “Protecting and improving Scotland’s environment”, which was published in January this year. The report noted that, although Scotland was meeting the 2010 European targets for landfill and preventing an increase in the production of municipal waste, local authorities would struggle to meet targets beyond this year. SEPA has voiced similar concerns, which have been reported in the press today.
By 2025, councils will have to collect, recycle and compost 70 per cent of municipal waste. That will require additional waste management facilities. I understand that those facilities will be identified in the final plan, but wonder whether the means of funding the new facilities will also be identified. In particular, I would like to know what the role of the Scottish Futures Trust will be in funding them. Last week, the cabinet secretary advised me in an answer to a written question on the role of the SFT in delivering the zero waste strategy that it is working with COSLA to collect data and supporting local authorities in securing value for money, and that it had initiated a waste procurement forum to disseminate best practice. That is all very laudable, but members should remember what happened on 20 May 2008, when the Scottish Government launched the business case for the SFT. The SFT was lauded as
“the way forward for infrastructure investment”.
Ministers also promised a Scotland-wide municipal bond. The SFT was supposed to be about funding and investment as well as about advice, data collection and value for money. Perhaps the cabinet secretary can clarify whether he supports waste management facilities being funded in future under a non-profit-distributing public-private partnership model.
Ministers will no doubt wish to remind members of the zero waste fund of £152 million over three years, of which local authorities have received £80 million. That money is not ring fenced, but it is intended that it be used to deliver the waste management targets in councils’ single outcome agreements. I will make two points about that. First, Audit Scotland has stated that those targets are unlikely to be sufficient to meet European targets for reducing biodegradable municipal waste that is sent to landfill beyond this year. Secondly, is the funding that has been made available enough?
Dumfries and Galloway Council, which is a fairly small local authority, secured funding from the former strategic waste fund for a private finance initiative agreement with Shanks to construct and operate an Ecodeco mechanical biological treatment plant for its municipal solid waste. The contract is worth £270 million over 25 years, which is more than £10 million a year. That has enabled Dumfries and Galloway Council to leap from the bottom of the recycling and recovery league tables to somewhere near the top. Irrespective of the pros and cons of the means of treatment—it does not, for example, separate different colours of glass and therefore glass cannot be recycled as glass; rather, it has to be used as a replacement for aggregate—or the method of financing, the project demonstrates the scale of investment that is needed in waste management. At the moment, I do not see where that investment will come from. I also wonder how local authorities are to be encouraged to work together on joint projects without the up-front carrot of levering in funding above and beyond their somewhat pressured council budgets.
There is a genuine issue here. We all aspire to zero waste and I am sure that we all want a long-term strategy that must be longer term than single periods of government. We need to understand and tackle how the strategy will be funded and that means that we need to understand how we work with the private sector. There is difficulty with council budgets, so we need to consider how to lever in funding from elsewhere in order to fund some of the projects.
I was pleased to note the agreement last week between the cabinet secretary and the Labour Party’s shadow cabinet secretary that there is a pressing need to tackle commercial and industrial waste in Scotland. The cabinet secretary reiterated that today. Household waste accounts for only 15 per cent of the waste produced in Scotland. The reduction of domestic and non-domestic waste needs to be considered jointly. I understand that that is also in the plan and I look forward to finding out more about it.
The amendments of Liam McArthur and John Scott—the new best friends—both express sentiments that we share. I understand that there is a problem with the wording of the Liberal Democrat motion in that it mentions the publication of the document rather than the process, but I look forward to Liam McArthur’s explanation of that in his contribution.
I am pleased to move amendment S3M-6275.1, to insert at end:
“and to address the concerns raised in the Audit Scotland report, Protecting and improving Scotland’s environment, that councils need additional waste management facilities to meet national landfill and recycling targets.”
15:36
I welcome this debate on how to further reduce waste in Scotland. It is important that we do that because recent volcanic events have emphasised how vulnerable we are as a society and, indeed, as a species to the smallest climatological change. Reducing waste directly reduces our carbon emissions. I know that we all agree that that must be our direction of travel even if, as Elaine Murray said, we do not know how to fund that goal.
It is worth noting that huge progress has already been made in the field of municipal waste reduction and I applaud South Ayrshire Council for having achieved among the highest recycling rates and acknowledge the efforts made by other high-achieving local authorities
Today’s debate is about zero waste Scotland and the incorporation of seven former programmes into a single delivery mechanism, which I believe will be welcomed across Scotland. Scotland is a small country and the creation of a one-stop-shop Government agency that replaces seven previous programmes makes good sense, notwithstanding Friends of the Earth’s reasonable concerns about the loss of educational programmes targeted on waste prevention projects. I also welcome the further development of the concept of treating waste as a resource, rather than a management problem. In that context, huge potential exists for job creation in the area, given that we have 20 million tonnes of raw material to start with. The creation of 2,000 jobs is suggested in the Government’s plan and a real opportunity exists for businesses large and small in the recycling business. Local and export markets for recyclable material and the uses that such material can be put to will grow again.
The minister said that the 25 per cent maximum figure of energy produced from waste would in future be from all waste. How does that differ from what it was before?
I said that we are potentially moving away from having a cap—the current cap applies only to municipal waste—to regulating instead what can be put into energy-from-waste plants. The advice that we received through the consultation is that that is a better regulatory tool.
I thank the minister for that clarification.
Reducing food waste, as highlighted in the Government’s plan, is another area where much more can easily be achieved. Currently, around 30 per cent of food purchased in supermarkets is not consumed, but thrown out. With food security becoming an issue, household budgets under increasing pressure and greenhouse gas emissions increasing, the waste of 30 per cent of consumable food is almost criminal. I am certain that most people are not aware of how much food they leave on the side of their plate or throw out of their fridge and vegetable rack in the kitchen. That so much more could be done in our homes and kitchens to reduce waste, and therefore greenhouse gases, is a message that is not yet fully understood. In pursuing its zero waste policy, the Government should address food waste in future public education programmes.
The elephant in the room, to which my amendment refers, is non-municipal waste and what is to be done with it. As the Federation of Small Businesses asks in its briefing, what can be done to give small businesses greater access to kerbside recycling? I say to the minister that that is perhaps an easy win. Although we have made huge strides in reusing and recycling municipal waste, we have not as yet tackled head on the problem that 40 per cent of all our waste is industrial and commercial waste. Historically, we have had access to cheap landfill. Infrastructure has not been put in place and investment has not been made to deal with trade waste. That will be the emerging problem of the next decade in waste management terms.
The problems of municipal waste are now largely being addressed. Although, of course, more must be done to reuse and recycle and to design out waste in packaging, the broad direction of travel in relation to the resolution of municipal waste issues has been established. However, that is not the case with non-municipal waste. There are those who argue that the huge effort put into resolving municipal waste issues has diverted attention and resources away from resolving the issue of commercial and industrial waste.
Perhaps the minister will tell us in his closing remarks how he hopes to address the problems of industrial and commercial waste. A new zero waste strategy is all very well, but if it does not help to put new infrastructure in place for non-municipal waste, our overall waste reduction strategy will be put at risk. The holistic approach that politicians of all parties so often espouse must be made real in Scotland if we are to be regarded as taking the issue seriously. I hope that the Government will tell us, if not today then soon, how it intends to address the issue.
In the spirit of moving the Government constructively towards its next goal, I commend the amendment in my name to the Parliament.
I move amendment S3M-6275.2, to insert at end:
“, and considers that greater encouragement to recycle and reuse must be given to the commercial and industrial sector and that a focus must be placed on ensuring that the necessary infrastructure is created and put in place in moving toward a zero-waste society.”
15:41
Back in March in this chamber, I had the opportunity to take a four-minute canter through the fundamentals of how we might deliver on our climate change objectives. Perhaps I should be grateful that only the Government’s waste strategy has to be covered this afternoon.
I welcome the debate and the chance to focus on what is a key part of the challenge that we face in relation to climate change and in managing potentially valuable resources more efficiently in these difficult times.
I am happy to make it clear that the Scottish Liberal Democrats will support the Government’s motion, along with the three amendments that have been lodged.
As the briefing that zero waste Scotland prepared for the debate makes clear, there has been real progress over recent years, which John Scott acknowledged. Under my colleague Ross Finnie’s stewardship, recycling rates in Scotland increased from an anaemic 7 per cent in 2001-02 to 25 per cent in 2005-06. Impressive though that rate of growth might be—further progress continues to be made—there is no escaping the fact that we started from an appallingly low base and that tougher, more complex and more costly challenges lie ahead, as the cabinet secretary acknowledged.
That is also reflected in Elaine Murray’s amendment, which rightly highlights the warnings set out in the recent Audit Scotland report, “Protecting and improving Scotland’s environment”, which drew attention to the potential difficulties in incentivising and supporting collaborative action between local authorities as a result of reductions in the overall waste budgets. I know that ministers have rejected that argument in the past. Nevertheless, fears remain that to meet the challenges ahead, not only will additional waste management facilities be necessary but councils will increasingly require to act in a collaborative fashion, which, in turn, has resource implications.
John Scott’s amendment identifies specific issues in relation to waste in the commercial and industrial sectors, which the Rural Affairs and Environment Committee discussed during its consideration of the Climate Change (Scotland) Bill. There was clear evidence that much more attention needs to be focused on improving rates of recycling and reuse in those sectors—some options were set out this afternoon. The evidence sessions that the committee held at that time also flagged up the risks in adopting different and potentially conflicting approaches to reducing and managing waste. The Scottish Environmental Services Association expressed its concern about proposals for deposit and return schemes, which its members felt might undermine progress that had already been made on kerbside recycling initiatives. The fear seemed to be that, given the cost of putting in the necessary infrastructure and the difficulties in terms of messaging for the public and businesses, it is essential that the Government and the public sector more generally take decisions and stick to them.
The Government motion points to the need for clear, long-term stability for the necessary investment to deliver a zero waste Scotland. That very much speaks to the point that SESA and others made during our evidence sessions. Whatever is adopted this afternoon as a statement from the Parliament must reflect the urgency of the situation. That is why I hope that colleagues, including Elaine Murray, will be able to agree to back the amendment in my name.
I understand that the cabinet secretary disagrees but, as a zero waste strategy was identified as an early priority in the SNP’s 2007 manifesto, it is reasonable to have expected quicker progress—all the more so when the strategy appeared in the list of achievements of the Administration’s first 100 days.
The urgency is brought home by the risks of not achieving the targets that have been set. The risks are that we will not meet our climate change objectives and that financial penalties will be imposed. COSLA’s briefing estimates that fines for non-compliance with our EU obligations could be about €500 million per day. The briefing also says that the
“costs associated with underachievement in the medium to long term would be high and highly divisive ... the likelihood is that councils who have been successful in reaching their intended targets would not share the financial responsibility for any failure, although this can not be guaranteed.”
Unfortunately, time does not allow me to go into great detail about the potential benefits of waste-to-energy projects, on which the cabinet secretary touched. That means not just district heating systems, but innovative anaerobic digestion, such as the facility in Westray in my constituency. Such projects have developed successfully in Germany and elsewhere in Europe. Through feed-in tariffs, we might be able to replicate that in Scotland. As the cabinet secretary conceded, sensitivities exist, but I trust that the Government’s zero waste plan will address the issue, along with the other matters that have been mentioned in this brief debate.
I look forward finally to seeing the long-awaited plan and I encourage members to support not just the motion but each amendment at decision time.
I move amendment S3M-6275.3, to insert at end:
“; regrets the delay in the publication of the Zero Waste Plan, and recognises the necessity of meeting EU landfill diversion targets in order to avoid potentially punitive fines.”
15:46
To achieve zero waste, as many people in the country as possible must be involved and must buy into the aim. That is probably the crunch. Through municipal waste initiatives, we have made good progress on the lamentably low base from which we started to measure. It is a credit to the people of Scotland that we have made such progress. In other countries, where such achievements have been attained over a longer period, greater progress has been made. We can expect to make more progress if we have the right attitude to involving people.
We must involve people through the debate about variable waste charging. WWF makes the important point that we must take into account the pay-as-you-throw approach to some kinds of waste. People in cities have problems with waste collection. The outside bins in Edinburgh that we pass on our way to the Parliament are an example of that. If we had bins that sorted the waste, that would be much more helpful. My local council—Highland Council—has different collection processes in different parts of its area, but we nevertheless have separation at source. People will not buy into the aim until we can help with that.
We talk about the costs of such activities. Education costs will be involved and how the pay-as-you-throw approach is used must be examined carefully. A young family in which busy parents are bringing up children might have great problems in finding the time to deal with waste. We must find ways to help such people. The reason why schemes have succeeded in places such as Germany has been sorting at source.
Commercial waste is a much bigger subject. We are having an extension added to our house. The architects and builders are fairly eco-friendly, but a huge amount of unsorted waste has nevertheless been generated. It is unfortunate that that, too, adds to the problems of raising our targets. Having commercial people sort out the waste before they take it to landfill—or before it is recycled, as we move on to that—will be a central part of making progress. Having talked to many of the builders who have worked on our little project, I believe that commercial sites contain many skips that are full of indiscriminate waste. If all that were sorted, much of it could be used, which would help us enormously.
If we are to succeed, we must of course minimise waste in the first place. I am sure that we will have plenty of wood for our house’s wood-fired stoves for many years to come from the excess of what was used to build the extension room that I mentioned. I do not expect everyone to be in that position, but that is the nature of the game. That practical example tells us that recycling is one of the most important things that we can do.
I am concerned about food waste. If the Scottish Retail Consortium is going to tell us how much people waste, it is time that it took hold of the BOGOF offers issue. Buy one, get one free encourages people to buy more and then throw it away. We have to try to get the supermarkets to buy into reduction at source so that people do not get to take home such offers.
15:50
Last week, at rural affairs and environment question time, I put a question on waste management to the Cabinet Secretary for Rural Affairs and the Environment. I was pleased to hear Richard Lochhead outline the progress that has been made since devolution in 1999. The cabinet secretary rightly highlighted the excellent contribution that local authorities have made thus far.
The purpose of my question last week was not to obtain a list of statistics about where we are at present in respect of waste management, but to highlight the concerns that companies that seek to be involved in waste management in the years ahead have put to me. Having identified the role that they can play in meeting the Scottish Government’s waste management targets, the companies have set about proposing to councils how they can do so, only, in certain council areas, to be refused planning permission.
I am not asking the Scottish Government to take away planning powers from local authorities to ensure that such proposals are delivered—the companies I am talking about are not Donald Trump companies—but for the Government and our local authorities to take a joined-up approach. That would ensure that we not only reduced the amount of waste created by both the domestic and non-domestic sectors, but had the means to dispose of the waste and the funding to achieve the goals that we had set.
If we are to reduce further the amount of waste that is treated in Scotland, the Scottish Government will have to face up to its responsibilities to reduce the amount of waste that is created and secure the availability of appropriate waste management facilities. Some councils cannot be allowed to duck what is required; they are using the concordat to avoid taking their share of the responsibility. Our local authorities have rightly embraced zero waste strategies, with some already having made a good start at waste minimisation but, when it comes to waste disposal, many appear to want to leave it to other councils to do their dirty work for them.
Waste is a consequence and symptom of the type of lives that we live. The challenge is not only to come up with grand plans for living our lives in ways that do not contribute to resource depletion, but to find practical ways of addressing what we waste and dealing with waste where it happens. It is not enough to ask all the right questions and have good targets, we must also will the means to deliver on the strategy. We must go beyond doing the easy things. It may not be low-hanging fruit that we are after, perhaps it is low-lying waste, but we have to deal with the bigger issues and not just tackle the headline grabbers.
All local authorities must be made to address the planning permission problems that they are creating so that waste is processed throughout Scotland and not transported around the country for disposal. We must avoid the situation whereby some local authority areas become dumping grounds at a time when others refuse to accept their responsibility to plan for waste management facilities in their areas.
The business of waste management has to be the business of both the Scottish Government and local authorities. The main requirement from both is commitment. That said, if we are genuinely committed to a sustainable future, we have to commit to the kind of planning decisions that are necessary to achieve that end. The word on the matter that we are hearing from the Scottish Government and our councils is unequivocal. That is to be welcomed. However, the evidence shows that their commitment is, at times, less than full.
15:54
From time to time, we have debates where there is little to choose between the parties. In the decade since devolution, successive Administrations have developed ideas and built upon them. Waste management is a policy area where the argument is often limited to the detail. Thus far in the debate, there has been consensus on the general direction of policy.
That there is a need for a zero waste strategy is common sense. It is important in our attempts to meet exacting climate change targets, given that the methane gas that is created by landfill is 20 times as damaging to our climate as carbon dioxide is. Such a strategy should bring about long-term improvements to the environment of our country. At the same time, it can encourage more efficient use of resources, boost sustainable growth and create jobs in new areas.
In 2003, the previous Administration introduced the national waste plan. In the interim, good progress has been made in several areas, but we all acknowledge that much more still needs to be done. I look forward to the Scottish Government’s zero waste plan moving us forward again.
Tackling waste is a multifaceted problem, and it must be recognised as such. The action plan will require to cover many specific policy areas as we seek to prevent waste, reuse materials and recycle them. I can cover only a couple of policy areas in the limited time that is available to me.
It was encouraging to note that recycling rates had reached 39 per cent in the two most recent quarters for which we have statistics. We can be cautiously optimistic about reaching the 40 per cent target for 2010—although we will have to see whether we can reach future targets. The findings from the first national survey by Scottish councils on the subject of waste highlight major opportunities for households to recycle even more if they have the opportunity to do so. Two thirds of newspapers and magazines are being recycled, but we are struggling with other materials. It was striking to note that, in comparison, only 19 per cent of plastic bottles are being recycled. There are undoubtedly a number of reasons for that, first and foremost the technical difficulties of recycling that material and the availability of facilities. We need to ensure that local authorities—in both rural and urban areas—are providing more facilities and easier collections for individuals. I hope that that sort of issue is detailed in the action plan.
It is our failure to deal with food, more than any other type of waste, that requires most work, as many members have already mentioned—particularly if we are to continue to meet our targets under European directives on landfill. I welcome the support that the Government is providing for anaerobic digestion plants and other facilities for dealing with food waste. I look forward, in particular, to seeing what lessons have been taken on board from the trials that have been taking place in several local authorities to collect food waste from households.
It is vital that we do not focus on municipal waste to the detriment of the bigger picture. As members have already mentioned, we must start to shift our attention to commercial waste, which fills five times as much space in our landfill sites as municipal waste. Work under the Waste and Resources Action Programme and voluntary agreements are welcome, but we need to do more.
It is worth noting, at this exciting time in UK politics, that the key policy lever of the landfill tax remains under Westminster control. The Calman commission recommended that that be devolved to the Scottish Parliament, and I certainly hope that that happens in the near future and is dealt with quickly by the new friends in the Tory and Liberal Democrat parties.
15:58
Like other members, I welcome today’s debate on this important environmental issue. It is unfortunate that, with less than a year to go until the Scottish National Party finishes its term of office, we are still waiting on the waste plan.
In any Government waste strategy, environmental justice must be paramount. Worryingly, research has shown that more deprived communities bear a disproportionate burden of negative environmental impacts, such as industrial pollution.
On 24 January 2008, the Cabinet Secretary for Rural Affairs and the Environment told the Parliament:
“the Scottish people voted for a Parliament that would improve our environment”.—[Official Report, 24 January 2008; c 5491.]
I hope that the cabinet secretary will acknowledge that the idea of “environment” means more to people than simply a global view of carbon reduction targets. Under the Scottish Government’s zero waste strategy, people’s local environments and communities should not be sacrificed for the purposes of meeting global environmental targets. It is essential, in pursuance of perfectly laudable aims on waste reduction, that recycling centres and new waste disposal plants are not situated in built-up residential areas, where associated pollution could cause a disproportionate burden in the form of poor air quality, increased traffic and noise nuisance. That is particularly important in areas such as mine that have suffered from their industrial past.
The cabinet secretary will be aware that I wrote to him in September about the concerns of thousands of my constituents in relation to an application by Shore Energy to build a pyrolysis incinerator in Coatbridge. My constituents think that the construction and operation of that private business venture would have a negative impact on quality of life for the many families who live in the large residential areas that are adjacent to the proposed site—and for families throughout Coatbridge.
The Coatbridge area has sufficient waste reduction facilities, as Michael McMahon said, and has suffered from landfill sites over the years. I do not intend to stand by and allow my constituency to become the waste capital of Scotland. Coatbridge cannot be the dumping ground for everyone else’s waste. Maggie Proctor, one of the protesters, said at a public meeting:
“We cannot, and will not, accept that this incinerator is necessary for Monklands.”
She went on to say of the company:
“Their only risk is financial, they are asking us to risk so much more.”
In response to a question that I asked in the Parliament, the cabinet secretary said that North Lanarkshire Council
“has already passed the 2010 recycling target and has achieved a commendable rate of 41 per cent. It is clear that the member’s area is making substantial progress and we should pay tribute to it for doing so.”—[Official Report, 7 January 2010; c 22541.]
Particularly given that the council is meeting its targets, it would be unfair, environmentally unjust and completely unacceptable to impose a pyrolysis plant on my constituents.
I am happy to say that North Lanarkshire Council has rejected the planning application for the plant. It would be a bad day for democracy if the clear wishes of thousands of my constituents and the considered opinion of the local authority were overturned following an appeal by a single private company.
I welcome the amendment in Elaine Murray’s name. Local authorities need more assistance in meeting targets, and I am pleased that North Lanarkshire Council has surpassed its targets for this year. I understand that Government faces a major challenge in meeting the zero waste targets and I question whether meeting them can best be achieved by leaving waste management in the hands of private companies, whose overriding concern is the maximisation of profit and who depend on volumes of waste to make money—that is ironic.
If the Government is serious about improving the environment on a local as well as global scale, serious consideration must be given to the direct funding and building of recycling and waste facilities in a not-for-profit way. That is important in relation to an untested process such as pyrolysis, the pollutant effects of which are disputed. The process could be dangerous to health, to our environment and to our children’s wellbeing.
I tried to make the point earlier that if we had not-for-profit arrangements the energy that was produced could be used for the benefit of communities rather than for the profit of privateers.
The Scottish Government must ensure that no single area is burdened with a disproportionate number of waste management facilities.
Concern for the planet, the local environment and our children’s future should be the motivating factors for any Government in implementing the zero waste strategy. The issue should not be left to privateers in their pursuit of profit.
16:02
It is fair to say that progress has been made since the Greens first pushed the zero waste agenda in the Scottish Parliament and the issue was first debated here. There have been achievements that Scotland can celebrate, especially the work of our community businesses, which deliver the real gains in reuse.
As the cabinet secretary said, Scotland has also increased its household recycling and composting rates. However, more than half of our potential recyclates and raw materials are still being thrown away into landfill or making their way to incineration. We are not yet witnessing the transformative shift to waste reduction and minimisation that Scotland so urgently needs.
A zero waste Scotland is part of a green economy, in which waste is designed out of the system, products are made to be easily reused and recycled, and resources are used as efficiently as possible. Waste is no longer seen as waste; it is viewed as a rich resource that can create wealth and jobs. I have often said in that context that we need to change our language. Perhaps we should try never to use the word “waste” until we are talking about something that has been thrown away—only at that point does something become waste.
It is helpful that we will soon have sight of a plan that will, I hope, set out how the Scottish Government intends to make the genuine shift that is needed. However, what will the plan contain? I have four questions for the cabinet secretary. First, will a target be set for overall waste reduction, which is the most radical and most urgent solution? Secondly, will a specific target for reuse be set? Thirdly, will the Scottish Government end its support for building a new generation of the incinerators that many councils in Scotland propose, despite repeated local rejections of those mass-burn plans? That relates to the issue that Elaine Smith raised.
Fourthly, I have been distressed by the fact that there has been little recognition in the debate so far of the huge contribution that community recycling has made over the past 10 or 12 years to motivating the people of Scotland to recycle. Groups such as the Golspie Recycling and Environmental Action Network, Colinton community recyclers and the Campbeltown recycling initiative have made a tremendous contribution. Will there be some recognition of that in the plan that the minister will show us at some time in the near future? If not, it would be wholly regrettable.
Does Robin Harper share my concern that such projects might suffer from the underfunded council tax freeze?
That is a sensible concern to raise, and I thank Elaine Smith for it.
Becoming a zero waste Scotland requires leadership and commitment from the Scottish ministers, who need to demonstrate how we can transform Scotland’s attitude to resource use, otherwise any zero waste plan will simply become a waste of paper in itself. It might say the right things, but if ministers and councils do not do the right things we will not achieve the transformation that we need to benefit our economy, reduce climate change emissions and benefit people’s health.
How will the zero waste plan—this is another question, sorry; it is number 5—cut across other ministerial portfolios? Will the cabinet secretary join forces with the energy and climate change ministers to ensure that recycled materials can end up becoming insulation to warm people’s homes, thereby saving money, improving health and cutting carbon emissions? Will there be a joined-up plan?
I hope that it will be made clear in the forthcoming zero waste plan that zero waste is not only about reducing waste as rubbish but about reducing wasted energy through poorly insulated houses. That is the kind of understanding of zero waste and commitment that we need from ministers if the plan is to be taken seriously.
16:07
The Scottish Government’s proposals for a simplified and coherent zero waste policy are essential. The goal should be twofold: first, to increase recycling and composting so that we reduce the waste that goes to landfill; secondly, to make recycling straightforward and easy. A Scandinavian friend who knows about such things told me that he had counted 76 types of recycling system available in today’s Scotland. With his background, he is probably correct.
As any archaeologist will say, there is nothing so informative as a midden. From the rubbish of the castle of Dunadd, we know that in the middle of the dark ages the Celtic kings drank wine from Bordeaux and imported herbs from the eastern Mediterranean. We have enough sense to be historians ourselves and to note and understand how changes in our way of life have influenced the increase in waste and its control and handling. For instance, we should consider the impact of central heating. Those of us of a certain age remember how much was burned in the grate of the home fire. So many ways of recycling things—such as briquettes made out of newspapers—were devised and used to handle waste at home.
We must consider matters such as heating, large supermarkets, excessive packaging and the use of bottled instead of tap water. At any point along a Scottish road, it is possible to see a lorry running from Scotland to England carrying Highland Spring water passing a lorry loaded with Perrier water travelling to Scotland, which makes one wonder a bit about the progress of today’s civilisation. Can such patterns be reversed?
How does the waste output change from the young to mature families, single people and the elderly? I recollect, as a young father in Germany, having huge quantities of waste to deal with because of used nappies. For the elderly, sadly, the same process tends to repeat itself. What are their requirements when it comes to recycling, and does landfill actually work? In a famous landfill case in Germany, a thoughtful council dug up its landfill site and discovered that, 20 years on, most newspapers, far from decaying, were still quite legible and that nappies were still intact.
There are different strategies for dealing with domestic waste, one of which is simply to avoid producing it. We have already heard about the amount of food that is thrown out—£1 billion-worth in Scotland alone, which amounts to an estimated £430 per household. People could be discouraged from two-for-one offers by having to think about whether they will use all the food, which might be beneficial in targeting avoidable food waste. Production should be shifted towards biodegradable and recyclable products—for example, biodegradable paper nappies would be as effective as nappies made out of cellulose, and we could ensure that all food containers are fully recyclable.
We could have deposit systems for glass, plastic and metal drinking containers, which are very successful in Europe and increase recycling of some materials to more than 90 per cent. Consumers could be given cash penalties for not returning items, which would allow producers to curb wasteful packaging. Sellers could provide intake points for bottles.
We could also simplify matters by co-ordinating recycling across Scotland to prevent confusion among users and recycling companies and to reduce overall costs. As other EU countries have shown, it is more efficient and easier to collect in wide categories, such as paper and cardboard, organic waste, plastic and synthetic materials, and some metals. It can be difficult to separate manually different types of waste, but up-to-date recycling technologies can separate it automatically. After a certain time, the technologies pay for themselves.
Getting energy from waste raises the problems that Robin Harper pointed out, but burning need not necessarily be involved, because there are other methods of getting energy from waste, for example using forms of organic destruction that can yield useful by-products and energy.
All that is useful, but let us remember, once we have dealt with our waste and rubbish, that the great power station of Longannet shoots 7 million tonnes of carbon dioxide into the air every year and is only 36 per cent efficient.
16:12
A commitment to zero waste is a fine thing that we can all agree on—indeed, we can do so this afternoon. However, I am concerned about the termination of waste prevention projects. Friends of the Earth Scotland ran a project called communities reducing excess waste, which was funded by the investment in community recycling and social enterprise III programme, with a focus on waste prevention as opposed to recycling. The CREW project involved training days throughout Scotland, providing community volunteers with the training, skills, resources and motivation to run their own events, projects and workshops within their local communities. However, after a year and a half, funding for the final year of the project was terminated. Now, that was a waste, especially since losing funding in the final year did not allow for proper evaluation.
Community development takes time. It is not enough to recruit volunteers then not give them the tools, not the least of which is paid workers to support them. Communities need support and time to put resources in place to allow projects to flourish. They need support in project planning, staff recruitment, training volunteers and so on. That can take time, but the CREW project was cut before it had time to build up a head of steam.
I am also concerned about the impact that such cuts have on volunteer numbers. Such abrupt termination of funding discourages community participation and undermines public confidence in programmes. Why is the Scottish Government pursuing a policy of public disengagement in that regard? Doing so is contrary to the aims of the Climate Change (Scotland) Act 2009. Waste prevention projects should be given priority to enable public engagement and awareness raising, and reduce the need for landfill diversion and recycling.
The lack of monitoring and evaluation is disappointing. There are always lessons to be learned. Ignoring those lessons wastes taxpayers’ money. Evaluation should be integral to the Scottish Government programme, not something that can be abandoned on a whim. I have written to the cabinet secretary on that issue, but many questions remain unanswered. On that basis, I am not sure how well he would be evaluated.
There are a number of questions that he may wish to take the opportunity to answer. What percentage of waste prevention projects have been cut? How many projects are ending due to Scottish Government budget cuts? What percentage of waste prevention projects that are funded by the INCREASE III programme will be terminated in 2010?
We need a more ambitious and more joined-up approach to climate change and environmental issues. It is simply not good enough that the climate change programme, including the commitment to public engagement, is not mainstreamed across all Scottish Government departments.
The zero waste plan will be welcome, but Government rhetoric needs to be reflected in practice. If communities are to participate in waste management, they need the resources and tools that will allow them to do so. As ever, actions speak louder than words.
We move to the winding up speeches.
16:16
It goes without saying that I welcome the chance to sum up the debate. Of course, Liberal Democrats support the idea of zero waste and waste prevention and, by extension, any initiative that is aimed at achieving it. This has been a fairly convivial debate, in that that view is shared across the parties. I am glad that my new friend John Scott agrees with it, just as David agrees with Nick.
My only disappointment—which is a significant one—is that we have been here before, as other members have said. Little progress seems to have been made since January 2008 on producing a defined zero waste strategy. That is especially disappointing given the good start that the Liberal Democrats made in 2003, under Ross Finnie’s stewardship, with the launch of the national waste strategy, as Liam McArthur and Shirley-Anne Somerville recognised.
Christopher Harvie highlighted the problem of nappies in German landfill sites. Although Scotland has met some landfill targets a year early, levels of recycling in some areas of Scotland remain unacceptably low. According to SEPA, Scotland recycled or composted only 34.25 per cent of its municipal waste in 2008-09. The target is to recycle or compost 40 per cent of municipal waste by 2010, but the rate in some local authority areas is as low as 18.5 per cent. Although the upward trend in recycling rates is welcome, organisations such as SEPA and the FSB continue to believe that a lack of suitable infrastructure and facilities is having an impact on that trend.
According to a report in 2007 by Audit Scotland, there is no guarantee that Scotland is on track to meet its 2013 landfill directive targets. Only 26 per cent of all councils are confident that they will meet those objectives. The process will be made harder by the removal of £26 million from the zero waste fund, which is especially worrying from the point of view of fines. Audit Scotland’s 2007 report concluded that three councils—Aberdeenshire, Scottish Borders and Dumfries and Galloway, which Elaine Murray mentioned—had been penalised for exceeding their landfill allowances. The fines that were imposed were recognised to be relatively small at the time, but the report went on to say that future penalties would be more severe and could pose a risk to many councils. Information from SEPA suggests that as the Scottish Government has allocated annual landfill allowances to each Scottish local authority until the 2009-10 financial year, it remains unclear where local authorities stand.
In October 2008, Richard Lochhead indicated that fines that were associated with the landfill allowance scheme had been temporarily suspended because COSLA and the Scottish Government had entered into discussions to determine how best to ensure that waste management targets would be achieved in the longer term, but in an answer to a parliamentary question in 2007 he stated that if the UK failed to meet landfill directive targets in 2010, 2013 and 2020, the regulations provided for supplementary penalties for those authorities that exceeded their allowances. However, in the zero waste plan consultation, it was revealed that the landfill allowance scheme has been suspended in principle until May 2011, which is quite an interesting date, and I fear that we might be building up problems for the future.
Also worrying is the issue of targets, to which Robin Harper alluded. The Audit Scotland report identified that many councils might have difficulties in meeting their 2013 landfill directive targets and, according to an Audit Scotland survey, only 26 per cent of local authorities were confident or very confident of meeting their 2013 objectives, while 74 per cent were either unsure or not very confident, and 23 per cent were not confident at all. As the report said, with the combination of tight timescales and the volume of waste that current schemes can treat, Scotland will not be able to treat enough residual waste to meet our 2013 landfill directive targets.
There is much work to be done. In its fourth year of power, the Government disappoints us by not having made quicker progress on waste. The Liberal Democrat amendment highlights the threat of fines if we do not meet our landfill directive targets, and I fear that the Government will try to pass responsibility for those fines to local authorities.
16:21
Today’s short debate has shown that all sides in the chamber agree on the need for a coherent waste policy to encourage the prevention of waste and the efficient use of resources. We also agree that investment in waste recycling infrastructure will be essential if we are to have any hope of delivering a zero waste Scotland: Elaine Murray made some interesting points about resourcing that. I therefore hope that the forthcoming zero waste plan will pave the way for reducing the amount of waste that we produce, for the reuse of resources, and for increasing recycling levels. The cabinet secretary has shared some of his thoughts on waste reduction this afternoon, and we await the plan with interest.
If we accept that a zero waste Scotland is our aspiration, everyone needs to consider how to contribute to that, whether we are householders, in business or involved in the public or voluntary sectors. If we succeed, the benefits will be considerable in environmental, social and economic terms, will help in the fight against climate change, and will afford significant business opportunities.
A number of speakers focused on food and commercial waste, which clearly contribute enormously to the total amount of waste that we generate. Any zero waste plan must target the 0.5 million tonnes of packaging and the 650,000 tonnes of food waste that are thrown out each year by Scottish households. With 75 per cent of all Scotland’s waste coming from commercial organisations, that must also be targeted.
Although I personally try to be careful when I am buying food, I am as guilty as anyone of generating food waste, which I am now trying to save for composting as far as possible. However, it is quite difficult for a housewife nowadays to stick to buying the foods that she needs with every supermarket pushing multiple packs of produce at her, as Rob Gibson highlighted. Just yesterday, I went to purchase a pack of yoghurt drinks to find that one pack cost £2.56, but I could get two packs for £4: a temptation that I could not resist. I will use what I bought, but similar offers apply to much more perishable foods like soft fruit and vegetables, which are then wasted. Indeed, it is sometimes hard to see the unit price in some supermarkets because the two-for-one offer, or whatever the offer is, is far more prominently displayed. We need co-operation from the supermarkets if we are to be encouraged to change our buying habits to avoid food waste.
Other members have dealt with large-scale commercial waste in detail this afternoon. Councils must get together with local businesses to identify their recycling needs and put in place the necessary infrastructure and the incentives to use it. I have a great deal of sympathy with the FSB, members of which are frustrated in their efforts to recycle waste by the current lack of kerbside recycling facilities and centres that are accessible to small businesses.
Zero waste Scotland is a welcome development. As the FSB pointed out in its briefing for this debate, until now at least seven different bodies delivered national business waste and environmental advice, on top of a lot of other local projects and organisations. That overlap of publicly funded organisations was inefficient and confusing for the business community. I hope that zero waste Scotland, as a one-stop shop, will be a greatly improved means of giving advice and support to businesses, individuals, local authorities and communities.
Zero waste is a desirable aspiration, but if there is to be hope of achieving anything even close to it, a huge effort will be required to change our habits as consumers, and serious investment will be needed to secure the necessary recycling infrastructure, especially for commercial organisations. I hope that the zero waste plan will be effective in moving us towards a zero waste Scotland, and I look forward to studying it in due course.
16:25
Notwithstanding my preference for debating a published plan and how it would be taken forward, this has been an interesting debate, in which we have talked about rubbish rather than talked rubbish.
A number of important points were made about waste reduction and prevention, improving recycling, community recycling and the problems of differential recycling rates. Michael McMahon and Elaine Smith referred to some local authorities becoming dumping grounds because others do not take seriously their responsibilities for the disposal of their own waste.
Several members referred to the sometimes contentious issue of energy from waste. Robin Harper and Elaine Smith spoke about pyrolysis, and Chris Harvie referred to other techniques that are perhaps environmentally preferable. Dumfries and Galloway Council had the first energy-from-waste plant in Scotland to use the batch gasification technique. It uses solid recovered fuel from the Ecodeco plant nearby, and it has helped address the problem, which Jim Hume referred to, of the likelihood of landfill fines for the local authority. The plant can produce up to 6.2MW of energy, enough to heat 15,000 homes, and it supplies that to the national grid. On the other side, only 15,000 of the potential 60,000 tonnes of fuel are likely to be produced by the mechanical biological treatment plant. The remainder will come from other sources, including hazardous materials such as food waste, tyres, inks, rubber and heavily contaminated food packaging.
COSLA states in its briefing that energy from waste has an essential part to play in local authority strategies. It argues that the approach should not be rigid and that the 25 per cent cap needs to be clarified. I am interested to hear that there has been a change of view from the Government, that the 25 per cent cap is now not likely to be implemented and that it will be replaced by regulation. That is to be welcomed, and I look forward to hearing more about it.
When we consider energy from waste, we must remember that it should be considered in the waste hierarchy, which is that waste that is used to produce energy must be waste that cannot reasonably be reused or recycled. Moreover, it should be coupled with efficient energy recovery and, if linked to efficient combined heat and power systems, it can be eligible for renewables obligation certificates and can contribute to meeting our climate change targets. However, we should not use the techniques if there is any other possible use for the waste that has been produced.
John Scott referred to the opportunities for employment in the new technologies and the possibility of 2,000 green jobs. Scotland must take advantage of the opportunities that are presented and the market development that is possible in new technologies for dealing with waste. In my constituency, one possible use for the former Chapelcross nuclear power plant is as a site for the development of green jobs in reuse and recycling.
Several members, including Robin Harper, mentioned waste prevention. Last year, WRAP—the Waste and Resources Action Programme—reported that £1 billion of food is needlessly thrown away at a cost of £430 to every household, rising to £550 to families with children. That is 570,000 tonnes of food, decaying to 1.7 million tonnes of CO2, which is a scandal when so much of the world is without adequate food. It is an environmental problem, and it is a waste of money to individual families. The issue needs to be tackled. Rob Gibson and Nanette Milne referred to supermarket BOGOFs and multiple deals, but there is also an issue of food being available only in large packs, which is not particularly handy for single or elderly people.
It is true that most families probably have no idea how much food and money they are wasting, which is why educating people about waste prevention is important. Cathy Peattie and Friends of the Earth have made an important point in raising concerns that insufficient emphasis and money are put on prevention rather than on recycling and reuse. Cathy Peattie described to us the role of the INCREASE III project in educating volunteers and the time that it takes to train those volunteers and to educate the public. It is a great pity that that project was terminated in its last year of funding, because it had an important role to play. Waste prevention—domestic, commercial or industrial—is at the top of the hierarchy and needs to be incentivised. We need to look at the ways in which we do that.
I am pleased to note the progress that is being made. There is cross-party support for the approach and that will remain stable in the long term, given that the issue will exist for many generations in the Parliament and we will have to continue to work towards achieving zero waste. We have done a lot of talking over the past three years, so let us get cracking, implement the zero waste plan and look at the way in which we will resource it in the future.
16:30
This has been a good debate. I am delighted that all parties wish to travel in the same direction and that we all find it unacceptable that in this day and age in Scotland we continue every year to send tens of millions of tonnes of waste, which is a valuable resource, to big holes in the ground. I agree with many members that there is a sense of urgency, because we want to tackle the issue sooner rather than later.
The Liberal Democrats suggested that there has been a delay in publishing the Scottish Government’s zero waste plan, which is due to appear in the next two or three weeks. I remind the chamber, especially a number of the parties that are represented here, that back in 1999 SEPA published the Scottish waste strategy. Four years later, SEPA and the then Scottish Executive published the national waste plan. It took four years for the previous Administration to get its original plan off the ground. In January 2008, the Scottish National Party Government, with the support of the other parties that are represented in the chamber—which we welcomed—announced its intention to have a new emphasis on moving towards a zero waste society. Two years later, we are on the brink of publishing Scotland’s first zero waste plan.
I have looked at my public comments on the issue. I said that the plan was due to be published in spring 2010, so I am surprised that the Liberal Democrat amendment states that there has been a delay in its publication. I appeal to the Labour Party and the Conservatives to note that it says on the internet today that spring in Scotland is due to end on 21 June 2010; I checked that before I came to the chamber. The secret cult of which the Liberal Democrats may be members may have a different calendar, but the calendar to which most members stick says that spring ends and summer begins around 21 June. I appeal to the Labour Party and the Conservatives to show common sense, of which I know they have volumes, and to accept that the Liberal Democrat amendment is not accurate. I am sure that they will not wish to support it. I am happy to support the Conservative and Labour amendments, as they highlight important issues that we must keep at the forefront of our minds.
A number of complex issues have been raised. Elaine Smith and Michael McMahon, among others, referred to the need to build infrastructure in Scotland to ensure that, as a nation, we meet the important targets that have been set. However, the fact that Elaine Smith and Michael McMahon represent the same party and are sitting on the same bench in the same part of the chamber highlights some of the difficulties and complexities that are associated with building the right infrastructure in Scotland. Michael McMahon said that councils must take brave decisions on applications for infrastructure and appeared to suggest that the Scottish Government should work with local authorities to ensure that such decisions are taken. Elaine Smith explained that she was campaigning against projects in her constituency—for perfectly valid and correct reasons, no doubt, but the difference between the two members’ positions sums up the complexities to which I have referred.
I cannot let the minister get away with that. There is no contradiction between what I said and what Elaine Smith said. We represent constituencies that sit side by side and we are aware of the number of waste facilities that exist in the localities that we represent. An additional facility in the area would not be welcome. Some companies are looking to North Lanarkshire because of refusals in other areas. We want everyone to take their share.
I am not arguing against the member’s sentiments. I merely pointed out that he commented that councils were rejecting too many applications and that that highlighted the complexities of the issues that we face as a country, because another Labour member on the same bench was arguing against having some waste facilities in the communities that she and Michael McMahon represent.
Tough choices lie ahead. Do we want to have a lot of landfill sites? Do we want barren landscapes, because we have used up all the resources, or do we want to have treatment facilities in some parts of the country instead? Those are difficult debates for our communities and it is only right that they should have a say in where some of the facilities are based. We will have to take some big, brave decisions in the months and years ahead if we are to achieve some of the targets.
Affordability is always an issue. I am surprised by some members, particularly on the Labour benches, calling for more direct funding from the Scottish Government, when we are all aware of the financial climate in which we are working. Less funding will be available to the Scottish Government in the future, not more. I ask Labour members, in particular, to think before they speak and call non-stop for more funds from the Government to address some of the important issues.
I was asking not for additional funding, but for clarification of the Scottish Futures Trust and how it might provide funding for infrastructure, and about the role of the Parliament.
I was referring to Elaine Smith, who called for more direct funding from the Scottish Government for some of these projects. I am highlighting the financial difficulties and the realism that is called for.
Will the cabinet secretary accept an intervention?
I am sorry. I have taken a number of interventions so far.
We cannot afford not to take action. Landfill taxes will have to be paid if local authorities do not take the relevant action and there are other penalties that could come down from the EU for Scotland, as a country. Those will, in turn, impact on local authorities if certain targets are not met. Local authorities are recognising that a good financial case is stacking up for building some of the facilities and for taking the right action around the country. I have a list of infrastructural projects that are in the planning system for many communities in Scotland. Some are, no doubt, controversial and some are absolutely essential if we are to achieve the targets.
Much has been happening over the past two or three years. We met our landfill directive target for diverting biodegradable municipal waste from landfill 18 months ahead of the 2013 deadline. Councils are now recycling approximately 36 per cent of municipal waste and are on track for the 40 per cent target by the end of this year. We have streamlined and simplified the delivery landscape for our zero waste advice and guidance and we now have the single zero waste Scotland delivery programme. The Climate Change (Scotland) Bill, which addressed some of the waste issues that we have been debating today, has gone through Parliament.
A new dialogue is taking place with the retail sector. Many people mentioned the role of our shops and retail outlets in packaging and related issues. From going into our local supermarkets and seeing the number of bags for life that customers are using, we all know that things are changing in that regard. Scotland’s first recycling zone has been built in the past couple of years and reverse vending machines have been installed in some supermarkets in Scotland. There have been a lot of firsts over the last couple of years. We are heading in the right direction.
We need a new emphasis and that is what the zero waste plan is about. I welcome the fact that many members have acknowledged the need for that new emphasis. The zero waste principle is about the fact that, as Robin Harper said, we should see waste as a valuable resource. We should treat all waste with equal importance. The emphasis, so far, has been on household recycling and municipal waste. Next, we will have to tackle all waste in Scotland. We must look at landfill bans, new regulatory measures, mandatory collection of food waste from households and early separation of materials to make all of that much easier. That is the new emphasis that we all agree on and which will be at the heart of the zero waste plan that will be published. As John Scott mentioned, the issue of commercial and industrial waste must be at the heart of that plan.
We do not have good robust data on commercial and industrial waste. We have to tackle that, and it will be addressed by the plan when it is published. We know the broad-brush figures, but we do not know where all the commercial and industrial waste goes and how much of that waste is transported. We must identify that in the first instance, perhaps before we can identify proper targets that we want to adopt. Let us, at least, welcome the fact that the industrial and construction sectors in Scotland have adopted a target in the past year or two to halve the amount of waste that they send to landfill by 2012. That is going in the right direction, and we have seen more producer responsibility legislation in this Parliament and throughout Europe in the past year or so.
Considerable progress has been made, much of it since devolution in 1999. People were elected to this Parliament because they wanted to protect Scotland’s special environment and resources. We have taken many decisions, on a consensus basis, to ensure that that happens. We need the support of the people of Scotland, who are changing their habits and lifestyles to support that aim. We also need the support of community organisations. I support the point made by Robin Harper and others that we owe a huge debt to social enterprises and community bodies that have played such a role in their communities. Some £2.5 million every year goes, through the proper channels, to fund that type of activity. However, I am happy to look into the points that were raised by Cathy Peattie about some of the wider impacts of local decision making.
We need the support of businesses, households and communities to travel down the road towards a zero waste society. I welcome today’s debate. I have taken note of a number of good points and we will do our best to ensure that some of them are reflected in the zero waste plan, which has not been delayed and will be published in the next two or three weeks.