Council agrees to reopen its main recycling centres

The four main recycling centres in Armagh City, Banbridge and Craigavon Borough Council will open early next week, it has been confirmed.
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The matter was discussed at Thursday night’s virtual council meeting, just hours after the Executive announced recycling centres and garden centres can reopen from Monday, May 18.

Prior to the meeting the Council’s Strategic Director, Mark Parkinson, had submitted a plan, for member’s consideration, to reopen recycling centres across the borough.

The plan sought to reopen the borough’s four main recycling centres in Armagh, Banbridge, Lurgan and Portadown. The borough’s five other sites (Keady, Markethill, Tandragee, Dromore and Rathfriland) are to reopen at an unspecified later date.

Addressing this plan, the Director acknowledged that the Executive’s announcement had changed the nature of the debate.

“There was an announcement this afternoon [Thursday] from the Executive that said travelling to recycling centres is, from Monday, an appropriate reason for travel,” said Mr Parkinson.

“With that in mind, what I would suggest to members is that we progress with the proposed model initially. However in the following days, we work to open the other five sites shortly afterwards.”

Addressing the issue SDLP group leader, Councillor Thomas O’Hanlon asked that this matter be dealt with under scheme of delegation in order to ensure that recycling centres can be opened promptly.

He also asked that Council’s bulky waste collection service be “restarted in tandem” with the reopening of recycling centres and queried how recycling centres could cater for those who are shielding.

His comments were address by Council’s Chief Executive, Roger Wilson, who said party group leaders had made their “desire to get centres open as quickly as possible” clear.

He also said it would be a “matter of practicality” if the decision were to remain under delegation as this would “remove the element of having to go through a call in period”.

Council’s Strategic Director, Mark Parkinson, said he would agree with Councillor O’Hanlon “on the point about bulky waste collection restarting at the same time” as recycling centres reopen.

Ulster Unionist Party councillor, Julie Flaherty, commended the “fantastic job” waste men and women are doing across the borough and said her party would support steps to reopen these centres quickly and safely.

The Alliance Party’s  Cllr Eoin Tennyson asked about PPE for staff and was informed by Mr Parkinson that the council has a sufficient supply of PPE.

The Director also informed Cllr Tennyson that Council is meeting with unions “every morning” to make sure “the equipment is reaching the right people” and the supply of this equipment is “reviewed on a regular basis”.

Councillor Darryn Causby welcomed the fact Council can now “get these centres open” and asked what type of material would be accepted at that start.

He was informed by Mr Parkinson that in line with the initial proposal the sites will accept “black bags and general waste until processors are back up and running” and that “over a period of time, we will expand the waste cycle”.

Independent Councillor Paul Berry called for a “common sense approach” to allowing certain trailers access to recycling centres.

“Some areas across this borough, do not have a brown bin for their garden waste and I think their needs to be a common sense approach towards letting some trailers with garden waste have access to these sites,” said Cllr Berry.

Lord Mayor, Councillor Mealla Campbell, agreed with this point. However, the Council’s Strategic Director explained that restricting sites to cars and black bags only is an attempt to deal with an expected initial peak in demand.

“We will get a vast number of people looking to bring black bags and access the centres,” said Mr Parkinson. “We are limiting it to cars initially to manage capacity. Once we are over that peak, and we expect that to be within a few days, we can look at allowing access to trailers and white vans.

“In regards to smaller sites, the other thing to consider is their size, if we get the demand we expect, we will be forced to close them again very very quickly as they will be at capacity.”

DUP group leader, Councillor Mark Baxter said he was concerned that if smaller sites were not opened quickly, residents in those areas could feel “short changed”.

His party colleague Alderman Gareth Wilson, said this issue was one the general public are “engaged with” and are aware that it is a service that can be offered with “social distancing kept in place”.

He also said Council needs to be very careful about getting the message across about what type of material can be accepted at these centres.

This view was agreed with by DUP Alderman Paul Rankin who said that if any announcement was to be made, Council would need to “give a timeframe or specify details on when the other five sites are going to open”.

SDLP Councillor Thomas Larkham enquired about the opening times for the four main centres and was told they would open from Monday – Friday 10am to 6pm, initially, in line with the report presented to members.

It was also made clear, following a query from SDLP Councillor Eamon McNeil, that a special time slot for NHS and other care staff would be in operation on  Saturday mornings from 8am to 12 noon.

DUP Councillor Margaret Tinsley then asked that Saturday opening hours be extended to allow all those back at work to access to the sites.

An announcement on the issue is expected from Council tonight (Friday), following a party group leaders’ meeting where the issues raised during the debate will be discussed.

Adam Morton , Local Democracy Reporting Service