Marie Sherlock (Labour) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister of State for his thoughtful contribution. I also thank Senators Kyne, Boyhan, Maria Byrne, McDowell and Warfield, and also my Labour Party colleagues Senators Hoey and Wall.

I believe I heard the Minister of State say he was very open to considering a system of competition for the market. That is a crucial point in our motion. We have always been very clear that in order to get to a place where we see the full remunicipalisation of waste services, the starting point has to involve local authorities having single tenders for waste collection across their areas.

I want to pick up on a point Senator McDowell made, namely that economics was missing in this debate. I assure him the economics of waste management is at the very heart of the motion. If he reads the motion, he might actually see we are trying to address the market failure entailing the lack of 100% collection coverage across the country. We are trying to address the environmental failure owing to the duplication of services in certain urban areas, where there is environmental waste in the form of emissions because of multiple trucks following each other around. There is a lack of incentivisation to invest in waste management systems because of the current lopsided system whereby waste operators collect bins for a charge while local authorities are expected to put on the free services and also clean up the mess left behind from illegal dumping. Of course, there is the risk of additional market failure when there is a natural monopoly, with a large operator effectively hiking up prices as it sees fit, and of course overwhelming reliance on a private operator for what should be a public service.

The key point we have heard in most of the contributions today concerned unhappiness and discontent with the status quo. There have to be changes, be they regulatory or of a different kind. There is work to be done with regard to the powers the National Waste Collection Permit Office, NWCPO, is given to be a truly effective national regulator for waste. It is given responsibility with regard to data collection and some oversight functions, but we have seen no evidence or information regarding the teeth it has to ensure waste collection companies are doing the job they are supposed to do.

Senator Maria Byrne raised the issue of waivers in Limerick. Limerick has the only local authority where we see this in operation. Ultimately, we cannot divorce the reasons for illegal dumping from the issues of culture, overcrowded accommodation, a lack of responsibility on the part of landlords, and, of course, pricing, particularly for those who have very little within their households. We believe that to address some of the issues related to illegal dumping, we must not consider them in isolation and just say people illegally dump for the sake of it. Some people dump illegally because they cannot afford it or because they are simply in overcrowded accommodation.

All the conversations about CCTV and strengthening the types of bags used in Dublin – Senator Boyhan talked the 900 streets that currently have derogations – are tipping around the edges. These matters are all very important and have to be part of the conversation; however, ultimately if we do not see reform of how waste management is organised, we will not see any dramatic improvement in respect of illegal dumping, fly-tipping or the attitude towards waste collection. We cannot hope to be a truly modern European city if we still rely on having bins sitting outside and do not have the underground systems we see in so many other European cities.

I thank the Minister of State for his contribution today and hope he will work with us. We want to hear more from him regarding what he has said about further developing initiatives so we can move to a system of competition for the market. There is a huge appetite. Those of us who knock on doors and talk to councillors across the country will know that waste is a massive issue and that there is a huge appetite for change. We need to see that change.