Toxic Waste (Hansard, 24 July 2000)

§ Mr. Meacher

UK policy on waste imports is set out in the legally binding United Kingdom Management Plan for Exports and Imports of Waste, which came into effect in June 1996.

The policies in the UK Plan prohibit most waste imports for disposal, and are designed to encourage countries to become as self-sufficient as possible in waste disposal. However, where countries cannot reasonably be expected to deal with specific wastes in an environmentally sound manner, the UK is prepared to accept them given that we have the necessary treatment facilities which meet tough environmental standards.

Consistent with this approach the UK currently accepts imports for disposal by high temperature incineration from Brazil, Guernsey, Ireland, the Isle of Man, Jersey, Portugal, South Africa and Thailand. We also have extant agreements to accept waste from Argentina, Chile, Egypt and Pakistan, although there have been no shipments to date from these countries.

We have only accepted waste for landfilling from the British Antarctic Territory, the Falkland Islands and the Isle of Man.

Earlier this year the UK made a bilateral arrangement to accept wastes from the Sovereign Base Areas of Akrotiri and Dhekelia on Cyprus for disposal by either option, although there have been no shipments under the arrangement to date.

The position is different for imports for recovery, which under European law includes incineration where the primary purpose is energy recovery. The UK Plan, consistent with the EC Waste Shipments Regulation and OECD Decision C(92)39/Final, permits movements of wastes for recovery between OECD members on the basis that this trade provides a valuable source of raw materials; and that no country is self-sufficient in waste recovery.

However, while any OECD member country may export hazardous wastes to the UK for incineration with energy recovery, to date we have only received hazardous wastes from Guernsey, Ireland, the Isle of Man, Jersey and the Netherlands.

UK policies and procedures on the acceptance of waste imports are being considered as part of the current review of the UK Plan. I have made it clear that the UK would 384W expect developing countries to develop, as quickly as is feasible, appropriate facilities to deal with their own waste, as far as is compatible with environmentally sound and efficient management.