A ‘significant proportion’ of the current 340 staff employed by Global Renewables will face compulsory redundancy should proposed cuts to Lancashire County Council’s (LCC) waste operations be agreed this week.

The Global Renewables waste recovery parks at Thornton and Farington are responsible for the reception, storage, treatment and transportation of 240,000 tonnes of residual waste, 66,000 tonnes of green waste and 78,000 tonnes of recyclable materials as part of a private finance initiative (PFI) contract between LCC and Blackpool Borough Council.

The two authorities took over the ownership of the £2 billion PFI contract with Global Renewables Lancashire Ltd, which originally owned the plants, and construction firm Lend Lease in August 2014.

Plans that will be considered by LCC later in the week, however, would see composting treatment cease at the two plants, while other processing treatments could be cut down where alternative disposal provides a cheaper option. Council food waste collections could also be scrapped if the plans designed to reduce the council’s budget by £8.5 million from April 2016 are agreed at a cabinet meeting on Thursday (26 November).

Thursday’s meeting will see the LCC cabinet attempting to plan for a forecast shortfall of £262 million in 2020/21. The council must cut spending by this figure, on top of previously agreed budget cuts, in the five years from 2016/17 to 2020/21.

Changes to the waste PFI in particular will see the revenue budget reduced by £8.5 million from 1 April and £12.25 million of reserves used over the next two years to fund a ‘transition period’ to enable the changes to the services by April 2018.

Both of the mechanical biological treatment (MBT) plants have dedicated in-vessel composting areas for garden waste, while Farington also has a materials recovery facility (MRF) for dry recyclables.

District councils in Lancashire currently collect co-mingled food and garden waste, but a budget report to be presented at Thursday’s meeting includes measures to ‘reduce processing activities and associated costs within the Farington and Thronton waste recovery parks, where these processes are uneconomic relative to available alternative disposal options’ and to ‘cease composting of co-mingled food and garden waste, advis[ing] waste collection authorities that in future the council will only provide facilities for composting green waste that does not include food’.

Should collection authorities still wish to collect food waste in addition to separated garden waste, it says, they will have to establish their own alternative facilities.

The Environmental Education service that is run at the Farington plant, which includes a visitor centre for school trips and adult and community programmes, will also be closed.

The council plans to undertake market testing and procurement activity to determine potential market opportunities for reconfiguring the entirety of the council’s waste services. This will include exploring the selling of assets, including the waste recovery parks, transfer stations and long-term landfill contracts.

‘The most challenging times for local government in living memory’

Announcing the budget proposals earlier in the month, Jennifer Mein, Leader of Lancashire County Council, said: “These are the most challenging times for local government in living memory as we face the combination of relentless central government cuts and rising demand for our services, particularly those serving vulnerable people.

“The reality of our financial situation is such that we will have to use the bulk of our reserves just to balance the budget over the next two years. And by 2017/18, we will only just have enough money to pay for our statutory services.

“At the same time, the government has made clear that it will make further substantial cuts to council budgets over the coming years… The scale of the challenge means that we will have to make ever more difficult decisions. We will do all that we can, and are targeting our resources towards those with the greatest need, but we will have to reduce or stop services and people will notice the difference. Our priority will remain to protect the most vulnerable people in communities across Lancashire.

“Regrettably I'm also no longer confident we can reduce our workforce as much as we need to on a purely voluntary basis.”

You can find details of the proposed cuts at Lancashire County Council’s website.