Self-catering firms’ waste costs mount

Chamber of Commerce tourism sub-group member Corrina Walker said they were disappointed self-catering sites would not have the option to be classed as businesses when it came to waste. Under the new system, each self-catering unit will be charged the £85 standing charge, even if it does not use the parish waste collection system.

States’ Trading Supervisory Board president Peter Ferbrache said that allowing all of the 384 self-catering units to opt out would result in an additional £4.50 a year extra charge for every household. The amendment went on to be defeated 19 votes to 18.

But Ms Walker rejected the president’s argument: ‘I don’t think the impact was ever going to be as big as they implied,’ she said.

Of the 70 self-catering businesses in Guernsey, 50 of them have five units or less.

Under the amendment, it was expected smaller units would choose to stay in the parish collection scheme, while larger ones would go for commercial collections instead, due to the amount of rubbish they produced.

Ms Walker runs Beau Vallon self-catering, which has 10 units.

‘Beau Vallon has already had to put its charges up as costs are going up all the time,’ she said.

‘This is an added one. This aimed to allow people to have an option of supplier which might be cheaper, but also more convenient. It’s not about getting a cheaper deal.’

Some larger self-catering businesses already have commercial collections and also pay the parish collection charge, even though they do not use the scheme.

Ms Walker said business owners would now be having to balance whether they wanted to continue paying twice.

The amendment was brought by Deputy Dawn Tindall. She confirmed that she was keen to push for a policy letter to be brought to the States so the matter could be looked at in more detail and she was now looking at a timeline.