Bid to stop increase in bin stickers cost fails
WHAT seemed like a small increase in the cost of refuse sack stickers to many would not be treated so lightly by some, States members were told as an effort was made to have the rise rejected.
A statutory instrument laid would normally be approved without debate, being something that a committee is able to do without the need for more than a nod from members.
But the instrument that would lead to an average 40p a week price rise in the cost to a household of bin stickers and an £8 increase in the fixed annual charge was going too far for Deputies Gavin St Pier and Lyndon Trott, who sought to have this move rejected.
It would be a regressive charge, said Deputy St Pier, at a time when people were struggling with the rising cost of living.
Deputy Trott reiterated this later and said it would hit people who were least able to pay the hardest.
The move to annul had been drawn up before news of September’s report from the States’ Trading Supervisory Board, he said.
The bid was opposed by board president Deputy Peter Roffey, who said that Guernsey Waste had had a bad year and these modest, run-of-the-mill rises would help reduce losses of about £1m. a year.
The scheme had become a victim of its own success in encouraging recycling, he said.
Deputy Neil Inder said in his opinion this was not recycling, since a lot of the waste that was separated was burned and he had never had a recycled milk carton delivered to him.
The cost of living crisis would be better addressed through the budget, said Deputy Sasha Kazantseva-Miller, who felt that this was the wrong occasion to try and deal with it.
Policy & Resources president Deputy Peter Ferbrache said the annulment motion was tokenism, but accepted that it would be common sense and prudent to look at the matter more broadly in September.
The move to annul was lost by 21 votes to 13 with one abstention.
