Bord na Móna waste business to go into private ownership

SIPTU condemns the reported sale of Bord na Mona Recycling to KWD Recycling

A major wheelie bin service looks set to go into private ownership with its sale resulting in a possible €6 million loss to the taxpayer.

KWD Recycling, a Kerry-based waste company, is understood to be the preferred bidder to buy Bord na Móna Recycling.

The Sunday Times reports that the publicly owned Bord na Móna is to sell its waste wing for €55 million.

It also reports that the semi-state company hired PWC earlier this year to find a buyer for its waste collection, recycling and landfill operations.

Bord na Móna completed a €61 m acquisition of waste management company Advanced Environmental Solutions (Ireland) in 2007. It was reported at the time that the acquisition of part of Bord na Móna's strategy of diversification into waste management and power generation.

SIPTU has condemned the reported sale to a private company when internationally the sector is being taken back under public control.

The Trade Union's Sector Organiser, Davy Lane, believes it is an election issue and the sale should be blocked.

“SIPTU will explore every option to halt this sale of a state-owned company which should provide the basis for a future of a service that international research has shown is best provided and managed by public bodies.

“This is an election issue. SIPTU members have lobbied candidates across Kildare, Laois, Offaly and Tipperary on the need to maintain Bord na Mona Recycling in public ownership. They have received widespread support and we call upon voters to remember a candidate’s position on this issue when they go to the polls on Friday,” he said.

SIPTU's Transport, Aviation, Energy and Construction (TEAC) Divisional Organiser is Adrian Kane.

“Bord na Mona Recycling, as a publicly owned service provider, should be the basis for the bringing back of domestic waste collection under public control. Internationally the move is away from the privatisation of domestic waste collection towards a public model of provision of this vital community service.

“Considering the re-municipalisation of domestic waste collection has also been recommended by Dublin City Council, the Dublin City Taskforce and the Joint Committee on Environment and Climate Action. Instead of accepting the findings of these bodies we have a lame duck Minister for the Environment, in the last days of his political career, selling off our last remaining publicly owned service to a company that has been fined €500,000 for breaches of its waste licence.”

“This amounts to a smash-and-grab raid on the possibility of the better future we could have for domestic waste collection in Ireland,” said Mr Kane.

Apart from having a significant presence in the Laois waste market, Bord na Móna also has planning permission for a anerobic digester near Portlaoise.

The company wants to covert 80,000 tonnes of commercial food waste, brown bin waste and animal waste to create gas for power generation and fertiliser at a site off the road to Mountrath on the edge of a Coolnamona bog. The biogas produced would be connected to the national grid in Portlaoise.