Mr. Richy Carrothers:

Across the EU, 2.2 billion tonnes of waste are generated. This is a fluid situation. Under the EU landfill directive, EU countries must reduce the amount of municipal waste sent to landfill by 2035, to 10% or less of total municipal waste generated. This situation and the regulation is just going to increase. It is now time to act. There is no point waiting for a further crisis point to make the decision. We have already alluded to the fact that 23% of households do not have a waste collection service at all. It makes sense and has been advocated by other NGOs and commentators. It leaves room for a significant number of illegal practices like illegal dumping and fly-tipping in rural and urban areas. Almost 45,000 tonnes of waste were unmanaged in 2016, and the clean-up cost is borne by local authorities. The model we are advocating makes greater economic sense than this unregulated, unaccountable model in situ. Whatever you hear from contributors this afternoon, they will not be able to take responsibility for the State meeting the European targets and legislation to make it more environmentally friendly and effective. Now is the time to act, which is why this debate is so welcome and we should seize whatever opportunities we can to bring this back to an insourced model.