Landfill Levy (Hansard, 24 March 1999)

§ Dr. Whitehead
To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions what proportion of the net yield of the landfill levy was from local authority payments in each year since it was introduced. [77675]

§ Mr. Meale
The net yield of the landfill tax was £360 million in 1997–98, the first full year following the introduction of the tax in October 1996. Initial data on waste arisings from the Municipal Waste Survey for England and Wales for 1997–98 will not be available until
244W
later this year. In addition, the landfill tax is payable to Customs and Excise by landfill operators on a registered person basis rather than a site specific basis. This makes it difficult to accurately calculate the proportion of landfill tax revenues effectively paid by local authorities.

§ Dr. Whitehead
To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions what estimate he has made of the additional financial contribution which will be made by local authorities for each of the years to which the Government have committed itself to escalate the landfill levy by £1 per annum. [77676]
245W

§ Mr. Meale
The Municipal Waste Survey for England and Wales for 1995–96 and 1996–97 shows that municipal waste arisings were approximately 26 million tonnes per year, of which approximately 22 million tonnes was disposed of to landfill. Until sufficiently reliable data are available for several years, it is not possible to be confident about the trend. This makes it difficult accurately to predict the future cost to local authorities of the announced increases in the landfill tax.
If one assumes that: the majority of the waste will be active, and so taxed at the standard rate of £7 per tonne; and that site operators will pass the tax on in full to their customers; and that the level of waste being disposed of to landfill is broadly in line with figures for 1996–97, the additional financial contribution from local authorities in England and Wales for each incremental increase of £1 would be approximately £22 million. We would, however, expect the tax increases to start to have an effect on the amount of municipal waste sent to landfill, even though there is little evidence so far that the tax has led to a significant change in behaviour. A delayed impact in this area is in line with our expectations.