• Address from where the waste originated
• A description of the waste collected
• How the waste is contained
• Volume of the waste either per load or annually in the case of regular collections
• When the waste was collected
• Who collected it
• A European Waste Catalogue number
• Licence or exemption details of the receiving facility
The idea of the WTN is to track waste arising and ensure that it is disposed of in a legally compliant manner by a Registered Waste Carrier at a facility licensed under section 33 of the Environmental Protection Act 1990 or at an exempt facility.
A lot of metal recycling facilities or scrap yards as they’re more appropriately called seem to think that they can bypass this system when accepting stolen drain covers, shopping trolleys, street signs and lead from some poor sods roof.
Generally, British industry doesn’t employ a dirty old git in a red Toyota pickup to remove three tonnes of manhole covers and we can therefore assume that he’s nicked them? But does the scrap yard accept them? Of course they do – does he have a fully completed Waste Transfer Note? Of course he hasn’t.
As long as the greedy metal recycling facilities pay out in cash money and overlook the lack of requisite documentation we will continue to see disappearing street signs, shopping trolleys being stolen from supermarket car parks and Reverend O’Malley mopping up the rain in the aisles from his leaking roof.
This situation could be ameliorated overnight however by the Environment Agency forbidding the payment of cash for scrap and instead demanding that payment can only be made by BACS relating to a Waste Transfer Note number but the metal recyclers don’t want this for some reason? I wonder why not?
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2 comments:
Gideon, during the summer at least three drain covers were removed from Barkham Ride in Wokingham, this occurred with hours of a traveller site being blocked by the local council. Also in Reading a Church had lead stolen from it's roof three times. Something has to be done. It also is not just the scrap metal industry, what about the "cash for gold" people, a thiefs dream, a fast way to fence stolen good for cash, items scrapped for there metal value, profit for the companies, evidence destroyed and thiefs paid, this trade also needs to be stopped.
Hello WA - thank you for your comment.
I think your drawing similarities with the 'cash for gold' merchants is spot on - they are both fencing stolen goods yet the Environment Agency don't seem to care about the bent scrap metal dealers accepting Wokingham's stolen drain covers.
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