Issue - meetings
Waste Service Update
Meeting: 17/07/2024 - Overview and Scrutiny Committee (Item 24)
24 Waste Service Update 
PDF 231 KB
Purpose:
To provide members with an update of current waste services and to provide a timeline and options for future service design and delivery.
Recommendation:
That Overview and Scrutiny Committee resolves to:
1. Note the contents of the report and provide feedback where necessary.
Minutes:
The Business Manager for Environmental Services presented a report that provided Members with an update of current waste services and also provided a timeline and options for future service design and delivery.
It was explained that West Oxfordshire District Council (WODC) had contracted with Ubico for waste collection, street cleansing, grounds and other ancillary services since 1 April 2015. Ubico was a Teckal company wholly owned by its shareholder councils, WODC is a shareholder partner of Ubico. Ubico’s contract with WODC is due to end on 1 April 2026. Ubico’s performance, particularly in terms of key waste areas of missed bins and container deliveries had improved significantly over the last 12 months, particularly since the introduction of a shared improvement plan between Ubico and Publica. The contract required WODC to notify Ubico of its intentions regarding a future contract before 1 April 2025. This report provided a suite of options for a future contract.
WODC was a key partner of the Oxfordshire Waste and Resources Partnership. The partnership was a very active collection of like-minded local authorities who were aiming to find collaborative ways of working to generate savings, efficiencies, environmental improvements, and other corporate objectives. WODC had led a review of strategic container purchasing across the partnership and identified quick wins for neighbouring authorities to make significant savings on their container purchasing. WODC have been named on a partnership contract for sale of recycling material, this joint contract was projected to provide significant savings for WODC, a paper was being prepared seeking approval for this contract.
The Business Manager for Environmental Services answered questions from Members and the following points were to be noted:
· There were active discussions going on to push new opportunities for a new recycling contract.
· The example in the report of 3-4 times a week collections was only an example and does not represent was the current thinking around the new government would do. It was requested that this be removed as to not to confuse residents.
· Missed material of any kind during a waste collection was classified as missed bins.
· It was requested that scattered bins be included in the report criteria and online systems were being developed so that information could be used to retrain crews.
· Think about how we can promote refill and reuse
Action point: The Business Manager for Environmental Services would investigate Councillor Mead’s address to find out what has happened with missed bins previously.
Action point: The Business Manager for Environmental Services would ask DEFRA to speak back to the Committee regarding broken equipment.
RESOLVED that the Committee AGREED:
1. To Note the Waste Service Update.