What do our Parliamentary candidates think about Javelin Park?
Last week we asked all Gloucestershire’s prospective parliamentary candidates for their position on the Javelin Park waste incinerator. Replies are in and the results are in the table below. Some candidates also gave us short statements and we’ve added those below the table.
| I’m against the Javelin Park incinerator | I support the Javelin Park incinerator | No response |
Cheltenham |
|
|
|
Alex Chalk, Con |
|
| x |
George Penny, Lab |
|
| x |
Max Wilkinson, LibDem | x |
|
|
Cotswolds |
|
|
|
Geoffrey Clifton-Brown, Con |
|
| x |
Alan MacKenzie, Labour | x |
|
|
Liz Webster, LibDem |
|
| x |
Sabrina Poole, Green | x |
|
|
Forest |
|
|
|
Mark Harper, Con |
|
| x |
Di MArtin, Lab | x |
|
|
Chris McFarling, Green | x |
|
|
Gloucester |
|
|
|
Richard Graham, Con |
| x |
|
Fran Boait, Lab | x |
|
|
Rebecca Trimnell, LibDem |
|
| x |
Michael Byfield, Green |
|
| x |
Stroud |
|
|
|
Siobhan Baillie, Con |
|
| x |
David Drew, Lab | x |
|
|
Molly Scott Cato, Green |
|
| x |
Desi Latimer, Brexit |
|
| x |
Tewkesbury |
|
|
|
Laurence Robertson, Con |
|
| x |
Lara Chaplin, Lab |
|
| x |
Alex Hegenbarth, LibDem |
|
| x |
Cate Cody, Green | x |
|
|
Comments |
|
Alan MacKenzie, Labour | If elected I will do all I can to challenge how this was allowed to happen and will support the work David drew started over this. |
Chris McFarling, Green | I think this is the most expensive mistake to come out of Shire Hall. It undermines the waste hierarchy, produces more carbon emissions and dioxins, is a most inefficient way of producing electricity and if the money had been put into a public education campaign, we would have recycling and reuse rates the envy of the country. |
Di MArtin, Lab | Disastrous decision to build and suspicious means of working up contracts without scrutiny and oversight. |
Richard Graham, Con | Thank you for your email on the Waste to Energy Plant.
Gloucestershire’s aim is to recycle 70% of the county’s household waste, and then to dispose of what’s left as cleanly as possible, without using landfill.
The council looked very closely, over a number of years, at the most effective way of doing this, considering a large range of different technologies and chose the Energy from Waste because it was both environmentally acceptable and cost-effective for local taxpayers.
In support of that plan, the Council built a new anaerobic digester at Bishop’s Cleeve to turn food waste into fertiliser and energy, and the Javelin Park plant, which will dispose of the 30% of waste that can’t easily be recycled. Overall, Javelin Park will save taxpayers around £100m compared to the costs of sending rubbish to landfill. It will generate enough energy to power 25,000 homes as well, and cut CO2 emissions by over 40,000 tones each year.
So all in all, the main benefits of the project are financial and environmental and it is the right thing to do.
Meanwhile, the Recycling Centre at Hempsted had long been a blot on our landscape – a place where besides recycling clouds of seagulls feast on scraps among residual (i.e non recyclable) waste that has grown into a hillside of pollution. And we residents have all paid a landfill tax (fine) of up to £10 million a year for this ungainly horror.
That’s why I’ve always believed that closing Gloucester Tip was an important strategic goal for our city – releasing almost all the 360 acres for green energy and biodiversity, and perhaps a viewing point on top of the hill which Severn Way walkers could access. In addition, Enovert will before long plant thousands of trees, some of which in due course could be for biogas. Enovert will also consider a large solar farm to help source a large amount of new green energy for Gloucester. |
Cate Cody, Green | I am 100% against the Javelin Park incinerator |
Fran Boait, Lab | Thank you so much for contacting me and for your work in raising awareness of the issues of the Javelin Park incinerator. Like you and many other citizens, I am very concerned about the impact of the incinerator on both the health of constituents and on the local environment. Unfortunately at this stage it is not going to be an easy fix, but I am committed to not letting the incinerator carry on as it currently is. If we are both elected I will be working with David Drew, the most recent MP for Stroud, to ensure that the environment agency and other bodies are properly monitoring the incinerator. Ideally we will also either limit the type of waste it can burn (for example, burning plastic can be very harmful and it should not be allowed), or shut it down completely. With the climate crisis looming we know time is against us and we must stop harmful waste management like this. That is why Labour is committed to making producers responsible for the waste they create and for the full cost of recycling or disposal, encouraging more sustainable design and manufacturing. In government in Wales, Labour has transformed the position of recycling, placing them in the top five globally for recycling rates. A UK Labour government will learn from Wales’ example, and will make the rest of the UK leaders in recycling as well. We have also pledged to tackle the global plastics crisis by investing in a new plastics remanufacturing industry, which would create thousands of jobs. If you would like to find out more about our plans you can find them here: https://labour.org.uk/manifesto/ I hope I will have the opportunity to work with groups like yourself to tackle the damage that is being done to our local environment and communities. |