SF
Thomas Gould
Has the Minister of State considered the reintroduction of public service bin collections to reduce the impact of fly-tipping and dumping.
Dail Éireann · 2023-04-27
Party shown is the one held on 2023-04-27, frozen at parse time — not the speaker's party today.
The following categories of persons are eligible to apply for the Local Authority Home Loan under the Fresh Start principle: Applicant(s) that previously purchased or built a residential property, but is divorced/separated or otherwise and has left the property and divested themselves of their interest in the property are eligible. The Minister of State just said local authorities have responsibility for waste collection, and one of the reasons it could privatise it is where costs are unreasonably high, and that the power remains with the local authority.
If we have local authorities that do not have the funding to provide a bin collection service, because of Government decisions we are forcing local authorities to privatise. In fact, according to the Environmental Protection Agency, EPA, recycling has reduced, and all bin collection charges are doing now is encouraging dumping.
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Has the Minister of State considered the reintroduction of public service bin collections to reduce the impact of fly-tipping and dumping.
The Local Authority Home Loan is a Government backed mortgage scheme for those who cannot get sufficient funding from commercial banks to purchase or build a home. It has been available nationwide from local authorities since 4 January 2022 for first-time buyers and fresh start applicants. The loan can be used both for new and second-hand properties, or to self-build. A ‘Fresh Start’ principle applies for applications to the Local Authority Home Loan.
The following categories of persons are eligible to apply for the Local Authority Home Loan under the Fresh Start principle:
Applicant(s) that previously purchased or built a residential property, but is divorced/separated or otherwise and has left the property and divested themselves of their interest in the property are eligible. Applicant(s) that previously purchased a residential property, but have been divested of this through insolvency or bankruptcy proceedings, are eligible to apply. The applicant must be discharged from bankruptcy proceedings. It should be noted that a return to solvency should not be interpreted as a return to creditworthiness, which is a separate assessment.
In recognition of such instances, an exemption to the First Time Buyer eligibility criteria can be applied under the Fresh Start Principle to assist these people to purchase a home when they have left the family home. I have no plans to further expand this criteria under the Local Authority Home Loan at the present time.
Bin charges have increased by 10% since 2021. People are now facing the prospect of having to pay for their compost to be collected. This flies in the face of the excuses used at the time of imposing bin charges to encourage recycling.
The Minister of State just said local authorities have responsibility for waste collection, and one of the reasons it could privatise it is where costs are unreasonably high, and that the power remains with the local authority. If we have local authorities that do not have the funding to provide a bin collection service, because of Government decisions we are forcing local authorities to privatise. If we look at the amount of waste they are throwing away, it has stayed the same since 2010. In fact, according to the Environmental Protection Agency, EPA, recycling has reduced, and all bin collection charges are doing now is encouraging dumping. The reality is that when families are stuck between heating and eating, their last priority is waste collection. If people have a choice of putting shoes on their children or paying for their waste collection, what would they do?
Deputy Gould is way over time.
A waiver should be in place for elderly people and people with disabilities.
My Department has been providing support for an ambitious regeneration project across four areas in Limerick City since 2007. It focuses on the areas of Moyross, Southill, Ballinacurra Weston, and St Mary’s Park and addressing the causes of disadvantage in these areas through a holistic programme of physical, social and economic regeneration.
The Limerick Regeneration Framework Implementation Plan 2014-2023 which was adopted by the Council in 2014 provides a roadmap for the physical, social and economic regeneration of the target areas. A breakdown of all funding provided under the Limerick Regeneration Programme since 2016 is set out in the table below.
Physical projects include construction, refurbishments, thermal upgrades, demolitions, acquisitions, etc.
Social/Economic projects include the social intervention grants and community initiatives such as CCTV.
Operational Costs include staff salaries and office operating costs.
The Minister of State is over time.
The council lost a huge quantity of money on waste collection and does not want to go back there.
I wish to point something out to the Minister of State. He provided funding for anti-dumping initiatives in 2022. Of the 13 projects in Cork city, only one was on the north side. The communities that got the funding were the ones that were most affluent and probably least in need of it, while the communities that were most in need did not get it. Perhaps they did not have the interest or organisation to apply for it. Could the Minister of State explain that?
We have a situation now where there are voids, vacant houses belonging to local authorities, which are a magnet for dumping. I raised this yesterday with the Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage, Deputy Darragh O'Brien. There is an unbelievable amount of dumping and antisocial behaviour.
Vulnerable people such as pensioners and people with disabilities should be given a waiver. Will the Minister of State provide funding to local authorities for a waiver? Some local authorities provide a waiver to those vulnerable people and others do not.
I thank Deputy Gould.
Either everyone is treated equally, or they are not. That lies with the Minister of State.
In the context of the council's role, I want to ask the Minister of State whether he believes it would be helpful in terms of promoting recycling if there was more information on the rate of contamination of collections to be provided through the various providers. I refer to greater clarity on the destination of the different waste streams and perhaps better clarity on the labelling of packaging so that people would have a much clearer view of the way in which they should treat different items.
I was in Cork city last year meeting Cork City Council and the waste collectors, the people who collect the waste themselves, so that I could get a good input, in particular on dumping. I was not aware that there was a problem with anti-dumping initiatives being focused on wealthier areas. I will look into it. That is not the point of it. We are introducing CCTV very shortly to catch commercial dumping operations – criminals who are dumping in areas where they think they are going to get away with it.
To respond to Deputy Bruton, I will look into the rate of contamination. One of the most important things is to give information to people about the destination of waste. There are a lot of myths around where waste goes. People just do not understand where green bin waste or brown bin waste goes. There are stories that it all goes to China or that it is not reprocessed. I have gone to visit all of those facilities and I have seen what happens. I think we could do better at providing information through services like mywaste.ie and so on, through videos to explain to people where waste ends up.
Could the Minister of State say anything about the waiver?