Michael Kitt (Fianna Fail)

I welcome the Minister to the House. This is a complex debate but it is a relevant issue, there was even a discussion this morning on "Morning Ireland" about the difficulties in Cork with illegal dumping. The city manager in Cork assured us that his staff were dealing with the issue and collecting waste on a regular basis. There have been many scares recently and we have heard a lot about illegal dumping. I condemn what is happening, as I have done on previous occasions.

We have moved on from the time where every town in County Galway had a small, unlicensed landfill site. Many people wanted those landfills closed down. Their only advantage was the free service but people are now prepared to accept the principle of the polluter pays. There are now fewer landfills licensed and regulated by the EPA. I would be much more positive than Senator Bannon in regard to the recycling issue. The position has improved but we may not have reached a point where we are as good as other countries in Europe. We have come a long way since 1998 when we talked about 9% recycling whereas we have now reached a level of 28%. This matter is being discussed in schools. Some good booklets on the environment and the importance of preserving it have been produced in the European Union office in Molesworth Street, some of which I have taken to schools.

The last report of the EPA, the third EPA state of the environment report, had some positive things to say about the environment and the way in which we deal with waste management. A welcome development is that we are investing money in waste management. We have gone from being over-reliant on landfill to looking at issues of recycling. This has been welcomed by local authorities, although, as the Minister said, some local authorities are better than others. We are now considering recovering energy from landfills. In 2004, one of the issues I welcomed was the provision of funding of €36,000 to Limerick County Council and Ballinasloe Town Council to prepare model contracts for landfill gas to energy projects. We have had a landfill at Poolboy in Ballinasloe for many years. It was a welcome announcement that funding was to be provided with a view to getting gas from that landfill. In 2004, Galway County Council received €125,000 for bring banks, €128,000 for civic amenities and Galway City Council received €80,000 for bring banks.

There are now more bins in Galway city because of the availability of contractors and the great work done by Rehab in providing more bins. In rural Galway, there are two bins. In many parts of the country there are plans to provide a second bin for household waste.

I wish to refer briefly to a comment made by the Minister at the end of his speech in regard to the monopoly on waste collection. It appears that some counties have only one or two contractors. The Minister referred to the potential for anti-competitive practices and a monopoly situation, whether public or private. This leads to the issue of waste collection costs. Those on low incomes and social welfare payments have showed me the figures and the huge increases in charges over five years for bin collections. The Minister must examine this in any review carried out. I am pleased to note that in the past two or three years bin collection charges have remained at the same rate. When we seek a waiver we are told it is a private collection and that nothing can be done. This is disappointing for many people. The Minister will recall parliamentary party debates on a standard rate charge, which some local authorities can provide. Sometimes within one county there are different rates, for example, in the city of Galway, in rural Galway or Ballinasloe. People are concerned about this and particularly the absence of a waiver scheme, to which we had become accustomed in regard to water charges. I hope the review, to which the Minister referred, will take place.

The Minister referred also to the illegal cross-Border movement of waste from the Republic into Northern Ireland. Down through the years we had been familiar with various types of cross-Border activity — smuggling and so on. This is another issue that has led to concern. I hope the Minister will take whatever action he can to ensure illegal dumping does not happen. He mentioned, in particular, the Office of Environmental Enforcement, which is important to progress.

As others have said this issue could be the Cinderella of local authority services and environmental legislation. In most towns and villages there are bring banks and various facilities for recycling clear and coloured glass. A concern I have raised with our county manager is that if a person is providing a bottle bank he or she should empty it on a regular basis. There is nothing so disgusting as bottles left outside a bottle bank. Some people are too lazy to place their bottles or other recyclable goods into the banks. This has led to some towns and villages losing the facility. I hope that where a facility such a bottle bank is provided it is maintained, cleaned and emptied on a regular basis.

There is also the question of public awareness which is well provided for in schools but not so well provided for those who left school many years ago. I hope an improvement can be made in this area. The policy framework for modernising our approach to waste management, Waste Management: Changing Our Ways, was a positive document. It recognised there were many different options in regard to waste. There is no one-off solution in this complex area. Senator Bannon gave us a great insight into incineration. I would not start with incineration if I was talking about waste management, given that we have regional plans for 40% recycling——