A new recycling law came into effect in Wales on April 6th, meaning that all businesses, charities and public sector organisations now have to separate their rubbish for recycling.

The changes apply to all workplaces including those in hospitality, retail and agriculture. NHS hospitals and private hospitals have two years to get ready for these changes.

The following materials now need to be separated for collection, and collected separately:

• Food
• Paper and card
• Glass
• Metal, plastic and cartons
• Unsold textiles
• Unsold small waste electrical and electronic equipment (sWEEE)

The new law also includes a ban on the following:

• Sending food waste to sewer (any amount)
• Separately collected waste going to incineration and landfill
• All wood waste going to landfill

If businesses don't follow the new rules, they could end up in court or face an unlimited fine.

Whilst I very much support recycling, I fear these new workplace recycling regulations are overburdensome.

We need to make sure we take communities, businesses and the wider public along with us on the efforts to protect our environment. but changes like this will do nothing to help that journey.

In recent months, I have been contacted by a number of businesses, particularly holiday parks and visitor attractions, who are concerned about the impact of the regulations on their businesses.

The new requirements mean they will now have to do some sorting of waste on site and the existing recycling infrastructure that many of them have invested in has become redundant, with lots of investment required in new infrastructure.

Last month in the Senedd, I raised the concerns of the businesses who have contacted me, emphasising to Ministers that “not all businesses are able to monitor absolutely everything that visitors put into their waste receptacles”.

I pointed out the before this new law was introduced, many of them were using contractors to sort their waste for them in order for them to achieve high recycling rates.

I questioned the Trefnydd and Minister for North Wales, Lesley Griffiths MS, over the engagement the Welsh Government had had with the industry before introducing these changes, and asked whether “there may be an opportunity to have some exemptions or alternative arrangements for those organisations that are doing their best to recycle and are already achieving very high recycling rates, but just via a different route than this requirement, which does seem overburdensome”.

In her response, the Minister described the changes as “a great step forward” and insisted there has been “extensive engagement” with businesses. But this contradicts what businesses in Conwy and Denbighshire have told me.

Businesses have faced a tough few years as a result of the Covid pandemic and the Welsh Government should be doing everything it can to support them and help them flourish, but instead they seem to be hampering them in all manner of ways.   

Once again, it appears that this new law is another policy which the Labour Government has just rushed through with little or no thought for the practicalities of how this might work in practice.

The Labour Government should be listening to businesses, waste companies and local people on the best way to boost non-domestic recycling rates.