Agenda item

Mr P Aylward, Regional Director (RD) and Mr G Edwards’ Senior Contract Manager Norfolk (SCMN), were in attendance on behalf of Serco Environmental Services.

The Chairman invited Cllr C Ringer, Portfolio Holder for IT, Environmental & Waste Services to introduce this item. Cllr Ringer explained that the report set out the recent performance of the waste contract against various collection streams. The impact of route and round reorganisation followed by industrial action earlier in the year had placed additional pressures on staff. The peak in missed bin collections occurred in March/April 2023 and was associated with the industrial action. Since this had been resolved, there had been a steady decrease in the number of missed collections. 

Cllr Ringer went onto say that Serco now undertook more assisted bin collections (due to the ageing demographic in the district) which placed additional pressures on the service. Consequently, there was currently a higher level of missed collections for the assisted bin collections service. In future, there would be ongoing focus on improving these collections. Cllr Ringer reminded members that the service continued to improve and expand. A new battery collection service had been introduced earlier in the year and food waste collection was on the horizon. He said that two new vehicles were in the pipeline to support garden waste and trade waste collections. These were both ‘paid for’ services and brought in much needed revenue. Once the new vehicles were in place, pressure would be eased on general waste and recycling collection. He concluded by saying that the overall service was much improved and he thanked members for bringing issues to his attention and officers for their continued support. His inbox was no longer full of issues and complaints relating to waste collection, which indicated the service was moving in the right direction. 

The Chairman invited the Director for Communities (DFC) to speak. He began by saying that the main focus in recent months had been on achieving a significant and sustained improvement in collection rates. He was satisfied that this was now within an acceptable range and it should be acknowledged that it would never be 100% every day. Regarding garden waste, he said that there were challenges around capacity on certain days due to both the number of collections and the volume and weight. The added travel time to empty the vehicles impacted on the number of collections that could be completed in a day. The growth in garden waste subscriber numbers meant the rounds had reached capacity. The purchase of an additional vehicle would help ease this issue. It was the same for trade waste, with a new vehicle expected to reduce the current pressures on the service and also domestic rounds as well as supporting growth of the trade service in the future.

The DFC said that one of the main concerns of the Committee when previously considering this matter, had been around the challenges facing customers who tried to contact Serco to report problems. He said that Serco had worked hard to improve performance in this respect and moved from a position of below 50% compliance with the contract requirements at the start of the year to 90% now.

He then provided an update regarding the gap analysis, which had been a previous area of focus for the committee. The main issues had been covered in the report but in terms of outstanding issues, approximately 50% had been dealt with through a ‘commercial matters’ with Serco. The three authorities had agreed variations on the way in which it should be delivered and the remaining amount (about 60%) was in the process of being delivered. However, he emphasised that the bigger items were coming forward or had already been delivered. The Community Engagement Plan had been agreed by officers and it was hoped that this would be signed off at the next meeting of the Contract Review & Development Board. The Carbon Management Plan was back with the authorities now for final sign off.

The Chairman invited members to speak:

      i.        Cllr P Fisher asked if any particular areas were seeing more missed bin collections than others. He referred to his own ward of Wells where there were access issues for many properties. The DFC replied that where there were access issues, a smaller vehicle was used. The SCMN (Serco) added that he was not aware of any specific issues in Wells but if there were any particular areas that needed looking at, the Cllr Fisher could contact Serco and they would address any problems.

     ii.        Cllr J Toye asked about the use of pesticides for grounds maintenance and whether Serco was actively working to reduce their use. The RM (Serco) replied that accurate records were kept all of pesticide use and any applications were targeted, in line with legislative requirements. He added that they were also looking at options for alternatives. The DFC added that the contract required Serco to minimise the use of pesticides. Operatives also used additional tools such as wire brushes and hoes to ensure that pesticides were used in a limited and targeted manner. Cllr Toye replied that, in the way that options around electric vehicles and hydro-treated vegetable oil (HVO) had been set out previously, he would like the same approach to be taken for pesticides.

    iii.        Cllr Dr V Holliday said that whilst she accepted that the overall number of missed collections had fallen, she was aware of a number of households which continued to be affected. She referred to the contact centre data and asked if the service level agreement (SLA) required any performance outcome data to be reported or just the volume of calls. The SCMN replied that the target set out in the SLA was for 90% of calls to be answered within 20 seconds. Currently, the outcome of calls was not a requirement of the SLA.

   iv.        Cllr N Housden referred to the gap analysis and asked whether it had moved away from the target operating model (TOM) that it had been based on originally. The DFC replied that the three authorities had met with Serco to look at the gap analysis and it was agreed that some elements were undeliverable in the way that was being specified. He gave the example of an alarm in the cab that was activated when attending an assisted collection and which the crew had to deactivate. This was not available in the current software system so was therefore not deliverable at the current time and it was agreed that it was not a priority. Some other things were ‘nice to have’ rather than key to service delivery, such as a camera on the waste vehicle for recording potholes. This had now been removed from the list of deliverables but all core elements had remained.  He concluded by saying that he was happy to provide a copy of the gap analysis to members but they should be aware that it wasn’t weighted in terms of importance.

     v.        Cllr J Boyle referred to assisted collections and asked if there was any way to improve the current system which required someone to go ahead and pull out all of the required bins and then the crew to follow on and pick them up. This did not always seem to be a consistent, joined up approach and she wondered if there was a way to improve it. The RM replied that from an operational perspective, the information that was relied on to undertake assisted collections needed to be very accurate. During the period of industrial action earlier in the year, the service had relied on more agency staff and some of the knowledge of the local area was lost. Improving this still remained a focus and Serco was committed to this.

   vi.        Cllr C Cushing said that he was pleased to see the improvement in service delivery. He referred to page 30 of the report and the proposed reorganisation of routes and rounds in April 2024 and asked how extensive this would be. The DFC replied that it related to garden waste collection rounds due to an increase in the number of vehicles and subscriber numbers. The rounds were now out of kilter and difficult to deliver. There was currently a certain amount of co-collection on the trade waste service into domestic rounds. With the purchase of an additional vehicle, some current domestic rounds would have to be moved out and onto that additional vehicle and re-routing would help facilitate the growth of the trade waste service in the future. In terms of recycling and residual waste rounds, no plans for route changes had been shared yet. The upcoming mandatory collection of food waste needed to be taken into consideration. It had to be introduced before April 2025 for trade waste and for residential customers by April 2026. Discussions were underway as to whether this should be introduced sooner than 2026 and if this was the case, a substantial rerouting of residual and recycling waste rounds would be delayed from April 2024 to April 2025. Discussions relating to this were still in the very early stages. In conclusion, the DFC said that round changes would definitely go ahead for garden and trade waste collections but that other routes may wait. Cllr Cushing asked if there was any indication of a timescale for a costed option for food waste collection from central Government. The Environment & Safety Manager (ESM) replied that it was anticipated that capital funding would be announced by the end of the financial year but officers were making preparations now as it was likely that there would be a rush to the market for food collection containers. There would also be transitional funding to assist with the cost of re-routing and project management, as well as ongoing revenue support. No figures had been confirmed yet. The DFC added that 3^rd April 2026 was the ‘hard’ date for the introduction of domestic food waste collections, so it was hoped that funding would be in place before then as the Council wanted to go for an earlier start if possible to avoid congestion in the market. He said there was the possibility of having work undertaken by a company, looking across the whole of Norfolk to model collection patterns.

  vii.        Cllr L Shires referred to s3.6 of the report and customer contact figures. She asked for clarification as to whether the requirement to answer a call within 20 seconds also included re-directs. The SCMN confirmed that it was a target of 20 seconds to pick up the call and engage with the client. Cllr Shires then asked if Serco collected data regarding staff satisfaction with the company. The SCMN replied that an annual staff survey was undertaken but the response level was low and was hindered further by the period of industrial action between March to May 2023. He said that Serco was working hard to improve on this.

 viii.        Cllr P Fisher commented on the use of weedkiller in Wells. He said that in some parts of the town there were benches that were very close together and it was very unsightly when the grass was sprayed and then died. He asked if this was a widespread issue across the district or limited to just one operative. The RM replied that he would look into the issue if Cllr Fisher was able to provide more information after the meeting.

   ix.        Cllr M Hankins said that he lived on a mixed-use residential / holiday park. There was a continual problem of people not separating their waste into residual and recycling and he wondered what could be done about this. The DFC replied that this was a matter of educating people. He said that bin calendars were provided and any contaminated bins were ‘red tagged’ and then not collected if the problem persisted. The ESM added that communal bins were particularly challenging and acknowledged that contamination of recycling bins had increased in recent months. Cllr Hankins said that the majority of issues were caused by visitors who did not understand local requirements or who had no interest in engaging with them. The Chairman said that it was an interesting point and although a national standard in waste bins and collection would be very helpful in addressing this problem, an international standard would be the ultimate ambition as many visitors to North Norfolk were from overseas.

The Chairman thanked everyone for their input. He asked Cllr Housden if he wished to make a formal request for the gap analysis information.

It was proposed by Cllr N Housden, seconded by Cllr Dr V Holliday and

RESOLVED

1.     To note the update report

2.     To request that the gap analysis for the target operating model (TOM) is circulated to Members