Alice-Mary Higgins (Independent)
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On the procurement piece, there are a couple things. We mentioned the paint project as a very good example of Fingal explicitly putting out a tender for recycled paint.

However, in procurement we could have a price-to-quality ratio approach rather than a lowest-price model one. Reuse could be identified and named as a quality factor that gives advantage when tendering for any project. If a company has reused products within its bid, that could be recognised as something that gets a positive weighting in the procurement process. The witnesses might comment on that. It is one thing to name it as a requirement, maybe on a small-scale project, but if it were in larger projects it could become mainstream.

I was concerned with the mention of dismantling and how the permission to dismantle is not there now. I am wondering about goods that are not reusable - we are back into the recovery space really - and the question of precious metals and rare earths. It is one of the huge concerns and one where there needs to be strong incentives for manufacturers to ensure they are doing everything possible on this when producing goods. Perhaps there could be penalties.