Proposals for household waste recycling centres to be considered

Proposals for how household waste recycling centre services in Cheshire East could be provided in the future will be discussed next week.

Cheshire East Council wants to deliver a service that enables residents to recycle and dispose of their waste responsibly but is also within the limits of what is affordable over the coming years. 

This is in the context of needing to reduce spending by £100 million over the next four years, while continuing to support those who need help the most across the borough.  

At the 26 September meeting of the council’s environment and communities committee, members will consider proposals for how household waste recycling centres ( HWRCs ) can continue to be fit for purpose and safe for the public to use. 

The recommended option is to maintain sites at Alsager, Crewe, Macclesfield and Knutsford and to retain the mobile  HWRC service that has been operating since August – expanding its reach to cover more rural areas and those already impacted by high levels of fly-tipping. 

Extended weekday opening hours across summer months would also be retained, as would a booking system for visiting  HWRCs at peak times – during weekends and Bank Holidays – to encourage greater use of the sites during weekdays and later in the day.

Bollington, Poynton and Middlewich HWRCs , which are currently under an emergency closure to ensure essential cost savings can be made in 2024/25, would not reopen. 

Councillor Mick Warren, chair of Cheshire East Council’s environment and communities committee, said:

“In Cheshire East, we currently provide one of the highest levels of  HWRC provision per 100,000 of the population in the country, and we provide the longest opening hours for our customers in comparison to most other councils.

“While we understand that the option of reducing  HWRCs was not supported through feedback from the consultation, keeping services as they are now is simply not affordable.

“Each of our seven household waste recycling centres needs investment to bring them up to modern standards to comply with new safety regulations – amounting to more than £1.2m in total. 

“This investment is in addition to the significant annual maintenance and running costs of these sites, which continue to rise.

“The council is under significant financial pressure, as shown in the council’s medium-term financial strategy, and forecasting for this year already shows that this pressure is rising further – we must make difficult decisions and reduce our spending.”

Subject to committee’s approval, the changes are targeted to go live from 1 September 2025 once a new contract for the provision of  HWRCs is in place, with the emergency arrangements for  HWRCs that are currently in place continuing until then.

Cllr Warren added:

“If implemented, the option we are recommending focuses our limited resources on the sites that receive the highest use, while also ensuring that the vast majority of our residents are still within a 20-minute drive time of a HWRC , which meets national statutory guidance.

“Our proposals will also ensure that residents living in more rural areas can also access an adequate level of service through the mobile HWRC .

“We are proposing to expand the mobile service to cover eight areas where residents are not within a 20-minute drive time of a  HWRC site, or to areas where data indicates that incidents of fly tipping are at an increased level.”