RECYCLING TRIAL REVIEWED BY OVERVIEW & SCRUTINY COMMITTEE - WHAT FOR?

I think that this may have something to do with the current economic climate. The price for commodities such as paper has fallen so much that UK merchants are having to sit on huge stocks of paper & board that has been recycled until the price comes back up or sell it at a loss.

There were some reports that a number of companies were going to stop servicing 'paper banks' as it was costing more to collect the paper than it was worth on the open market once it had been processed!

Recycled or not, there has to be a market for the end product..

Maybe just maybe the council have seen this coming and put a stop to it before they get egg on their faces. Lets face it, if they went ahead with it and then we found out they were dumping the recyclables because they could not find a buyer we would have a field day...

Maybe I am being a bit benevolent as it is the holiday season.....

The infuriating thing about democracy my friend is that it doesn’t always do what you want it to do. To accuse councillors of “flexing their political muscles” and " can't be trusted to do their job" surely misses the point … unlike you councillors are accountable to the electorate ( the folks in this City that are sick and tired of not being listened too by far too many councillors).

The issue is a simple one .. to trial or not to trial. A trial should surely be the last stage of any consultation exercise ..simply because a trial .. no matter how well organised costs time money and will always cause annoyance and inconvenience to someone. (that ‘someone’ being the electorate ie the people you my friend don’t have to listen to)

Next important point ..why does “everyone” assume that doing nothing is not an option. In many instances it is often proved to be the best option after exhaustive procrastination!! The system presently in place for the collection of refuse has been developed over a considerable number of years and is well tried and tested. Is it not unreasonable therefore for democratically elected councillors to ask that the case for change be re-examined.

As long as the trial isn't prohibitively costed, then let them try. It makes them feel they are doing something,
though don't tell them all they are achieving is keeping the pot warm for the BNP!

This is just another way of the 'Independent/BNP' group trying to 'flex their muscles'.

The trial is to show if we can save over £1 MILLION without disadvantaging our citizens.

After the trial we can see if it works.

What 'pea brain' councillors we have that try to stop a trial, without committment, that may save us all £1 MILLION.

No wonder that some people see us as a 'basket case council'.

God help us if ever these idiots ever got control

my apologies to those that have read my previous comments on this subject.

the cabinet report that joy garner agreed to contained little detail. ie.

where is staffordshire 2nd waste to energy plant to be located and how much will it cost stoke ?

where is animal waste going to be composted and how much will the 15year contract cost ?

why composite animal waste and not use it as source of energy ?

what will happen to animal waste during trial as stoke has no way to deal with it yet' or will it be burned with the green waste ?

how do we match hanford energy needs td waste is diverted to other areas?

just a few question ali might find un important or aleady knows answer too if so please tell or ask joy garner to explain the new waste plan

rodger care to answer my questions tonight then. I've been asking for last month or so bit yet no one answered

Roger Ibbs, correct me if I'm wrong, what has the BNP got to do with this decision, or are you trying to infer rubbish collection is racism in disguise?
You state that "it MAY save us a £million, please expand on this statement.
I think the people of this city are wise to your ifs,and maybe's, that always cost us money, through incompetancy, and missmanagement.
As for idiots running the council well, isn't that what we have had for the last 60 years.
Ian Norris asks some very pertinent questions, lets here the answers from you and Joy Garner.

I'm all for recycling and in my opinion all households have a duty to society to recycle as much as they can! This scheme seems like like a no brainer to me, we recycle and save the city a lot of money. There have been many that have been accused of politicing on this site but in my humble opinion the Indies are bang to rites on this one!

tony care to answer the above and prove where savings being made for start animal waste can cost up to three times that of green compost plus need for another 15year contract. post your facts and prove your point instead repeating joy garner spin because it looks like others labour on scrutiny also want more details

Ian Man!
Give me a break for god's sake! I'm a blogger not a soddin' councillor, I'm giving my OPINION! What's with this Joy Garner garbage (no pun intended!) It's my view on the information put before us, that's all. I am saying I'M ALL FOR RECYCLING - OK?

The city council should be looking into creating its own recycling plants. Recycling paper that can be used both by the city council, schools, and any excess sold would be a good start, especially with the city council spending
nearly £600,000 a year on office supplies.
The city council should listen to the BNP and take a long, hard look at the advantages of a bio-gas plant here in Stoke-on-Trent. The incinerator at Stoke produces enough electricity to power 30,000 homes, the bio-gas plant scheme we presented to the council produces double that.
The demolition of great swathes of this city should also have provided a golden opportunity for the council to do some recycling, and save the taxpayer some money, but this was written off with the flimsiest of excuses.
The BNP suggested that instead of sending all this building rubble to landfill, or to be crushed, why not recycle it. The kerbstones, the paving stones, even the house bricks. The city council told us that it couldn't be done as everything had to be new!
We keep coming back to the same place when discussing anything council related, and that place is how the present ruling class are completely devoid of ideas on how best to help this city, and before you start Tony, I'm not making a political broadcast in favour of the BNP,
I'm simply stating the facts of where this city stands at the minute.
This city can be turned around, and it can prosper, but it needs the council to change direction and start showing some imagination, some innovation, and a far larger propensity for self sufficiency than we have at present. Failing that of course, you could kick them out and vote us in, and the BNP will lead the charge for change.

Ian Norris.
Animal waste can be used in the production of bio-gas. When the gas is drawn off, the waste left in the tanks is split into two seperate forms, liquid and soliid.
The solid part is pressed into small cakes of fertiliser and ploughed into the fields straight afetr harvesting, the liquid is stored in tanks and sprayed onto the crops in the spring after planting. Both are very rich in vital
minerals. This is also a part of the policy proposal we presented to the council.

Tony I accepte it just your opinino, so why attacking Indies for asking for more. then the below that was reported to Joy Garner.
Revenue Costs Summary Costs
Current ker side collection savings (1,600,000)
Blue bin collection costs1,600,000
Collecting grey bins (1,000,000)
Net Savings (1,000,000)

I think anyone would want more information then that, such as the questions I have asked, why go for invessel which is more EXPENSIVE why not go for bio gas which would create energy as Craig suggests.

This is the future of our waste for nxt 15years not just a headline "fortnightly bin collection" yet both you and Ali both attack indies for asking Questions and allow Joy Garner to develop what look like poor thought out plans, that is unless you have more information, hence the questions.

Craig thanks for your reply I was asking what will happen to Animal Waste during the Trail as the City as no facilties yet to recyclye kitchen waste.

The Real Roger Ibbs - "leader of the Conservative Group" condems the democratic decision to reconsider the decision to trial the new recycling proposals ... without even mentioning the word "waste" preferring ..words from my nursery days ... "pea brain" and "basket heads".
I shudder to think what childish logic he is applying to the re-organisation of our education system in the City ..not to mention TAG. Surely we all deserve better ..or at least someone who is more prepared to engage the brain before opening his mouth.

As far as I'm concerned, Cllr Ward and his group were completely justified to call this in for further scrutiny.

We all know how Stoke city council works-particularly under this administration. The 'trial' would have been nodded through at the end of the period without further scrutiny, and any consultation that took place would have been non-existant if it was anything like the consultation process we have seen over the electoral cycle. Oh yes, the council would have gone through the motions and done everything that it needed to do to make it APPEAR that they were consulting residents, but for the consultation to be meaningful, it really needed to happen at this early stage before it even got off the ground.

At the end of the day, this only holds up the process for a little longer. The city's environment will not be made or broken by this delay for a few more weeks; and as a consequence of their councillors actions our local democratic process is secured.

I fully agree with councillors Ward, Follows, Bell, Davis, Rigby and Hall in calling this in for scrutiny. Had the decision been mine, I would have been lining up right alongside them.

I would have liked to have seen the trial go ahead, however, I do agree that the Councillors were right to call in. If they feel that not enough consultation has been done, and that more detail and analysis into cost-benefit, risk assessment, recycling market and other practicalities is needed, then they have done the right thing. This is the whole point of having these Overview and Scrutiny Committee's.

The grey, blue and brown bins have been a success in other areas, and with proper planning can work for Stoke on Trent. I would like some more detail on the food waste going into the brown bin. Would this just be items such as peelings, or would this cover all food waste? Peelings, yes, but leftover curry, casserole, mixed with grass cuttings etc, not too keen on that.

Craig. this is a first, but I agree with you. The Council should look at having its own recycling plants, not sure how much this would cost, but after the initial expenditure, it may save money in the long run. Again, a bio gas plant is a good idea, but how much would that cost? These are good ideas, and should not be ignored. Have these been seriously considered?

nita: yes brown bin will include all kitchen waste including curries, thats why its more expensive to recylce then present method as it needs meet defra standards. and new contract will be for 15 years

Overview and scrutiny is part of the democratic decision making process of our Council, and as such I have no problem with any councillors calling decisions in.

As the recommendations the scrutiny committee have made are basically that they want a report on any problems experienced by the trial and to be kept informed as councillors as to what's happening, I can only assume that they were reassured by the information they received at the meeting about consultation, cost-benefit and representativeness of the trial.

So, either the original report the EMB saw lacked the necessary information to answer these questions - in which case, the EMB member responsible should be asking their officers to write fuller reports - or the councillors who called it in, failed to read the report thoroughly/at all, and called it in to 'flex their muscles', as Ali says. I'd be interested to hear which it is - shouldn't be too hard to find out.

Whatever the original reasons, it sounds to me like it will be going ahead, but with just a short postponement.

Nita, the reason the ideas have not seen the light of day since being put forward is they are too modern for this council, and they were put in by the BNP policy committee, whose chairman is Craig, thats why.
They will not listen to anyone, because they believe no one can think of anything better, especialy the BNP.
This is the main problem with councillors, they work for their party's not the city.
The only way this city will drag itself out of the gutter is all party's working together for the benefit of the city, not their party's.

Nita
The biogas scheme hasn't been seriously considered. There was a national seminar this summer hosted by Wardell Armstrong (Festival Park) about anaerobic digestion of waste and Council and Waste companies from around the UK attended. I know, I was there. Stoke City was invited but no-one from the City bothered to attend.

Terry,
As I have said on the latest article by Adrian Knapper, this site is there for ALL parties to put forward their visions. YES that includes the BNP! The BNP have 9 councillors in this city and despite being asked many times, none of the BNP councillors have contributed to the site! I have personally asked Alby and Mike to get involved. Despite what Craig likes to make out to the contrary I do want this site to be the forum for all party debates on policies beliefs and vision for the future. I may hold different ideals to the BNP but I will defend the BNP's right to have a say in the future of this city until the electorate decide otherwise. Terry you need to convince Alby and Mike that they are being left behind other parties because they are not getting their message out! People need to hear from the ELECTED representatives as well as party activists and supporters.

biggles: hardly surprising that news, do you know if the invessel contract and site has been agreed and set up yet for Stoke? with 15 yr contract for invessel I guess bio gas is a no starter in Stoke.

Ladyofthelake: its hardly a big report to plogh through, its linked of press release on council website, just look and the financial costing i posted aboved from the report to Joy Garner

Ian: I understand that they'venot managed to put together the technical spec for thetender yet, so they although they've shortlisted companies no final tender has been issued. Knowing the speed this Council operates at it will be some time yet.
In the meantime I'd like answers to the questions you'vebeen posing. Just where is the stuff going to end up?

So why did no one from Stoke on Trent attend this national seminar?
I cannot believe that not one person could be bothered to attend.

Terry, I have to agree with you. That will be the reason the idea was dismissed because it was put forward by BNP. You know my views by now on the BNP, but this is something that me and Warren agree on. If a good idea is put forward, it should be listened to and debated, which party it comes from is irrelevant, if it is for the good of the City.

biggles and they started to pland for this 3years ago and not even the tender is finalised let alone the site and they are starting trials? Sure Joy Garner knows what she is doing aint htat rignt Ali,Tony and ibbs

Thanks to all who have posted various comments and enlightened me on many ongoing issues. This is what I asked for. I merely posed a few questions. I agree the Overview & Scrutiny have a democratic right to call in decisions. I personally think the recycling scheme was a good idea (as Tony pointed out as well), but obviously there are much wider implications, touched on by Sir Findo and many other commenters. This is obviously a very important debate and whilst we need to try to move forward with a recycling scheme, it should only happen if the materials can actually be recycled cost effectively.

In my original post I was merely asking a few questions, and it seems our readers have been able to answer some of them.

What I would like to see now is one of the councillors responsible for this area (ie Joy Garner), or one of the Overview & Scrutiny members, coming onto the site and telling us what will actually happen next, how the council propose to move the recycling scheme forward, and explain to us how, together (as citizens and councillors), we can make the whole thing work!

I haven't singled out any councillor or political party for praise or slagging of in this article, because I believe it is everyone's responsibility to ensure we get this right. Can we do that do you think?

I think the real reason that other (more complicated) proposals are not debated is that there is a simple lack of knowledge and understanding amongst officers in the positions to make recommendations. Take a look at the report submitted to the Committee and you'll see a piece of child's homework, no real understanding of what the questions are that need to be answered and sketchy information at best. A terrible piece of work and one that any professional person should be ashamed of. Unfortunately for Joy Garner, that's the standard of info she's being fed with.

It would seem that bio gas brings some health and safety issues, which I was not fully aware of. Will have to research more.

Being a bit dozy here, but where is the garden refuge (brown bin) taken now?

I suppose it all boils down to the cost of bringing in these new ideas.

I am no fan of the coalition and will not defend it. I would much prefer a socialist Labour party in control of the council.
Of course decisions need to be open to scrutiny, but why was there a need for the Independents to force a meeting on Christmas Eve? Clearly the spirit of Scrooge is alive and well!
If they end up running the council next year the Independents may find out that it is a lot harder to come up with their own ideas rather than pick faults with those put forward by others.

ali: sorry to be a pain but you did single out city independent cllrs for ' flexing muscle ' and ' All this “review” will do is hold up a long overdue process.'

now you understand the wider picture- do you believe this should have been called in for all facts to get reported ?

Labours local apologist, True Socialist, is back spouting manure again. We have a Labour run council, and as Labour tout themselves as socialists then we must accept our local party as such, that being what they are.
How much damage are you going to allow this local Labour party to do before you say, "enough is enough."?
Far left socialist scum are the same people that the government is made up of, most of whom are ex-communists.
The last thing this city, or this country, need, is more of the attention from these people that would see an end to Britain, in favour of it becoming an outpost of an ever increasingly corrupt EU.
Independents, BNP, Pugh, Pugh, Barney, Mcgrew, Cuthbert,Dibble, Grubb, none of us could come close to inflicting the damage your precious Labour party has. How people can still support this shower after all the waste and stupidity, defies belief. You should have your right to vote suspended until a qualified professional says you are mentally capable of making such decisions.

Craig,
Fancy answering the point ref Alby and Mike contributing?

Tony: perhaps if you hide your biased views other cllrs would feel, more willing to take part.

When you and Ali attack Indies simply for calling a decsion by Joy Garner in without realising the wider long scale issue. and neither of you answer any of the above questions posed, why would they?

Coping and believing spin and preaching it in a blog as fact?

Tony can we have your views on the issues raised above, or you just want to attack the oppostion, who are in due simply posing different solutions and questionng costs. etc..

Tony your view please

Tony,
I give you my word I will try and convince them to
participate to some extent.

Craig,
Cheers dude! This site is taking off big style and has the eye of many, MP's, Cllrs, and more importantly the voting public!

Craig. You state Labour run Council, I thought it was run by a coalition, the EMB, made up of different political parties.

The Councillors have to be certain that the system will work properly, and more importantly they have to find the most cost effective way of doing it. In this case the Independents are right to call it in.

Ian, we would welcome any input from the Independent Councillors.

It is Nita, but Labour have the controlling interest.

Nita, biogas plants produce a flammable gas and so could be dangerous, but they are nothing new, Severn Trent have dozens, including the one at Stongford which generates over 2MW of electricity. The "new" bit is using waste as a fuel rather than sewage. In vessel composting however also has H&S issues as the fungal spores produced during composting can become airborne and have been known to cause a nasty lung disease called Aspergillosis. Look it up, not pleasant. One of the sites being considered for this In Vessel Composting is none too far from houses either.

biggles: Chatterley whitfield would have been ideal site for biogas, fitting into its sustainable energy basis and believe was listed for such. would i correct that invessel composting will go there? or could they just use the animal rendering site to dispose of kitchen waste for the meir trial?

Biggles. I've just had a look at Aspergillosis, interesting reading. It would seem that people with weakened immune system, lung diseases and asthma are more at risk, due to the spores that may come from the decaying plant materials.

So it would seem that invessel composting also carries some risks. So, if this is placed too close to houses, it may not be such a good idea.

People can criticise the Council on recycling, but it is not until you actually do some research that you realise what is involved. It is really not that simple to sort out.

The Council have not identified sites they've left it to the tendering companies to propose sites for the composting. I don't beleive Chatterley Whitfield is one of those proposed sites. For the trial I'm told that the kitchen waste would have to go to Leek to be mixed with Staffordshire Moorlands kitchen waste which goes to Ashbourne. Longer term Stoke (and Newcastle) would need their own site. The companies shortlisted for the IVC tender are not public knowledge but an educated guess would be the current contractor at Acton, Biffa at Newstead and another. no other waste company currently has suitable sites within the City. None of these sites has planning or the correct Environmental Permits to allow IVC or biogas operations and so would have to go through that before the scheme could go ahead. That takes a MINIMUM of 3 months and realistically would probably take 4 to 5, so I don't quite see how this fits with the April 09 start date the report to the Committee provides.

It dont all fit in, yet again council rushing things through at final deadline. the 2005 committee report said they would wait untill everything was in place before going for the kitchen waste route.

Guess any delay can now be blamed on those that called decision in tho, as most dont know or see the wider picture

Look it easy, we keep recyceling or we go back to the bad old days of burning the bloody stuff, thouwing Co2 and other crap into the air or leaveing it to rot down on Blurton tip, stinking half of the south of the city out. No contest, we have to keep going. F**k me, I sound like a Librel now, that'll never do.
Anyway this reminds me of a little inserdent I had a few years ago and still drinking like a fish. My wife at the time worked for a companey that sold wooden stare parts. We were invited one evening to the Managering Directers home for in dinner party with meny of the companeys supliyers and custermers. So whats the main topic to to talk about at that kind of party, you gessed it, F***in' wood. So yours trulys there, getting slamed out of his skull on JD and cola, the wifes puting herself about after orders and her eyes are off me, and I'm spoling for a dust up with someone.
This man starts chating with me for some reason, dont know if he felt sorry for me or not, and he's rabbiting on about the very high price of wood from Brizils rain forrests, what did I think. I told him use pine instead or words to that effect. That did'nt go down to well with him, the wifes boss or indeed anyone in the room at the time,including the wife and I was draged home and in the dog house for weeks.

Warren, recycling isn't the only GOOD option, there are others. The alternative to not doing this isn't the comic picture you portray but something else that benefits the environment. The reason Stoke is going for this form of recycling is clearly due to herd mentality rather than any reasoned thought process. One look at the Committee report would tell you instantly that not a lot of effort has gone into this.

Since the council finally responded to my FOI request
http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/approx_cost_in_vessel_contract#com...
I have sent the reply to all Councillors concerned in passing the Scheme but have had no reply, the FOI request has now gone to appeal as they failed to answer the questions, so as no Councillors have replied even after supposedly quitting the Labour group, I felt I needed to send the below letter to the editor of the Sentinel, will it get a response or merely brushed under the rug in hope the problem disappears?

Dear Sir
On December the 3rd 2008 Portfolio Holder for the Environment - Cllr Joy Garner agreed to what was termed “Enhanced Recycling and Waste Collection Arrangements” and was claimed to save the City £1million a year. I asked for more detailed costs of the scheme as those presented by Cllr Joy Garner was very basic being.
Revenue Costs Summary
Current kerbside collection savings (1,600,000)
Blue bin collection costs 1,600,000
Collecting grey bins (1,000,000)
Net Savings (1,000,000)

As there was no mention of the 15 year Contract for in-vessel composting needed to deal with the new mixed waste stream in the budget proposals, I contacted both Cllr Garner as Portfolio holder for Environment, Cllr Conway as chair of scrutiny commission but got no reply, I later contacted Cllr Clarke as Portfolio holder for resources and my local MP and still got no reply as to the fuller picture of this scheme. So as a last resort I submitted a Freedom of Information Request.
The replay was most interesting
Quote “The £1 million pound saving referred to in the enquiry and stated in the report does not come from the processing cost of green waste but from changes to the collection arrangements in moving to an enhanced weekly co-mingled collection.” So the £1million saving apparently comes from just cutting the number of collections to every 2 weeks.

As for the costs of the 15 year contract these were not provides under the Freedom of Information Request as and I quote “The City Council does not have a contract for In-Vessel. It is currently out to tender “so the City Council officers and Councillors are unable to give an answer to the future costs of the new collection process as they appear to have no idea what the estimated costs could be and certainly no idea on the full costs as no contract has been signed, but yet they press ahead rolling the scheme out across the City with apparently no process yet in place to deal with the mixed waste which will require a DEFRA licence to operate anyway.

And as the Council Officers and Councillors have gone for In-vessel composting because it deals with Cardboard, they will also lose the income from sale of Cardboard (whereas Anaerobic Digestion would produce energy to heat local houses).

Currently my Freedom of Information Request is at appeal stage as the Council failed to provide the estimated cost of the 15 year contract for in-vessel composting, I’ll update the letters page (Dear Editor permitting if I ever get an answer)

Ian Norris

Interesting - it sounds like they've picked how they are going
to proceed with very little detail on the costing.
That Anaerobic Digestion alternative linked to energy production
does sound like a very good idea, though I admit I don't know
any detail of costings of that either!

Nicky, Biggles did an excellent post on this subject, Craig, and myself worked on a biogas-bio-fuel plant, Ian Norris also put some excellent points, but were all ignored by this council.

Yes I've seen a lot of this and been interested in seeing something constructive emerge from it into the council. Now the old EMB has gone, how about putting the ideas in to council again. I've not got a lot of faith in Irving but why not give it a go under the new system.

Nicky, not a bad idea, will try, and let you know the outcome.

I suspect it's secretly an objection to the trials taking placing in Bentille and Meir Park, given the dominant political leaning of these areas (when taken together).

Depending on your view point, either the councillors do not want BNP prominent areas to be the first to get a new service, or they are worried that the reaction would be more negative than the city as a whole and thus undermine the trial.

I can't see any other reason for the objection.

Terry, by all means have ago, but I can't see them changing. The Officers and Cllrs that supported the Composting route have too much credibility invested in this to admit they were wrong and they won't change now. It's also a very technical subject and to be fair to our Cllrs it's difficult arguing against your own "experts" on a technical matter. So even if there is a willingness to challenge this, I can't see it being changed.

i agree chalenging method used is more dificult, but so far councillors even seem ok that they was never given full costings. they just accepted the 1 million saving given at face value, to exclude cost of 15 year processing bill is staggering. put if you dont ask you dont get answers, which is why scrutiny commissions continue to fail

mark have a read of Biggles blog

http://pitsnpots.co.uk/2009/02/recycling-good-everything-else-bad-contri...

and consider why the cost of 15 year contract is excluded from the budget, and why councillors aren't questioning it? was the propsed site for invessel composting THS?

Ive had a reply to qustion

Dear Hannah Quinn,

Can you explain why the invoices show Under the old scheme of Green Garden waste in Sept 08 it cost £26 per tonne to dispose of under the New ENHANCED scheme in August 09 it cost £65 per tonne, but your FOI reply 15 January 2010 states £73.89 per tonne and £75.33 per tonne

Yours sincerely,

ian norris

the reply

Dear Mr Norris,

The two figures, £73.89 per tonne and £75.33 per tonne refer to the old windrow collections and the trial collections respectively, but as a combined collection and disposal cost per tonne for each type of collection.

Regards,

Ian Butler

thats some saving on the new Collection costs, down £47.89 from to £20.33, how?

Cllr Paul Shotton"The food will be deposited in the open air. Why couldn't this be under cover of a building of some kind?"

this said when Labour Launched Green & food Waste collectin and still has no tender in place, even after collecting it seperatly for over a year? and then have the cheek to attack other who have gone out to tender on variety of ways to process green & food waste.

Cllr Paul Shotton, or and Labour Cllrs or Labour PPC please Clarify Stoke POSITION..

I expect no reply, but that BNP are to blame for are the @@~~~###

oops link :) for sentinel story

http://www.thisisstaffordshire.co.uk/news/City-councillors-kick-stink-fo...

You'd think this news would be a bit embarassing for Stoke's Officers. After all they said that there wasn't a suitable site for this in Stoke, which is why they've been using a facility in Staffs Moorlands. Smacks of hypocrisy to me for those Stoke Cllrs to criticise Newcastle for finding a site in Stoke that Stoke planners think is suitable when we're doing exactly the same in the Moorlands!

If I was a Stoke Cllr I'd be asking why Officers in Newcastle can identify a suitable site in Stoke but Officers in Stoke can't. That's the question that needs answering.

you'd also think it would be cheaper, for the council. They really should be asking Stoke officers questions, not attacking our Neighbours.

Budget 2009-2010 being reported

Waste Strategy orginal budget £809,000 then revised to £2,159,000 Final budget £2,121,000 So award themselves a Green for variance of just 2%, me thinks £1.3million overspend is not good variance of some 260% is more like it

And still no report on when they will tender for processing or when the review of waste is to take place.

Looks like council have finally found a site within the city for the development of a Anaerobic Digestion facility on the Excelsior Works on Garner Street, thus reducing transferring it to Ashbourne.

Still no details on Costs, or who will build, run and maintain facility, but its certainly a step forward and may help reduced that £1.3m overspend next year