The newest council to join the bandwagon of local authorities demanding that the money spent on landfill tax be put back to recycling is the Bradford Council.
Kicking off the campaign earlier in the year was the Local Government Association (LGA) which begun the campaign in advance of this year’s Budget to pressurise the Government to refund the cash to councils in order to enhance local recycling.
Bradford Council at the moment forks out thirty two pounds a tonne in tax for waste that ends up in landfills. In two years time the amount of tax is expected to be increased to forty eight pounds per tonne.
This however excludes fines that are going to be slapped by the EU for sending waste to landfill. If, and once, this is effected Bradford Council could end up paying several million pounds in landfill taxes by the year 2013. Estimates show that about seventy five per cent of the household rubbish in Bradford is sent to landfills and only about twenty five per cent undergoes recycling or composting.
The council is presently considering long-run solutions to its rubbish disposal and is deliberating on alternative technologies that could be applied for the disposal of waste. The council also intends to raise the recycling rate in the district to more than forty per cent in the coming few years. A short-term contract is due to be taken out for the treatment of waste through autoclaving. Some waste will however still be finding its way to the landfills.
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