Abandoned Cars (Hansard, 4 July 2003)

§ Huw Irranca-Davies
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs if she will commission research on the technology that would enable abandoned cars to be used in steel production. [122583]

§ Mr. Morley
Recent data obtained by the Department estimate that 93 per cent. by weight of the ferrous metal components of end of life vehicles is recovered for re-use or recycled to the steel industry. Abandoned vehicles are managed in the same way.

§ Huw Irranca-Davies
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs what measures she will bring forward for the disposal of abandoned cars. [122584]

§ Mr. Morley
Waste collection authorities are required under section 3(1) of the Refuse Disposal (Amenity) Act 1978 to remove a vehicle which is abandoned in their area on any land in the open air or on any other land forming part of a highway. Section 4 of the 1978 Act enables waste disposal authorities to dispose of vehicles in their custody which have been removed because they were abandoned. Such vehicles are normally disposed of through either dismantlers or scrap yards.
The dismantling and recycling of End of Life Vehicles (ELVs) must be carried out in compliance with the conditions of a waste management licence or under a registered exemption from licensing and in a manner which does not pollute the environment and harm human health.
The End-of-Life Vehicles Directive requires that all ELVs, including those abandoned vehicles which are ELVs, are depolluted and dismantled to specified 504W environmental standards by appropriately-permitted facilities. The permits will replace registered exemptions (unless a site is only carrying out recovery operations on de-polluted vehicles). Regulations to transpose this aspect of the Directive will be laid before Parliament shortly following a joint consultation with DTI which closed on 6 June about implementing parts of the Directive.
The Directive requires that member states shall set up a system according to which the presentation of a Certificate of Destruction (CoD) is a condition for deregistration of the vehicle. When the Directive is transposed into National law, it is expected that CoDs will only be issued by Authorised Treatment Facilities meeting specified site, storage and operating standards.