A proposed waste bylaw for Marlborough is an important next step in getting the region’s waste sorted.

The Marlborough District Council today approved a special consultative process to progress the Draft Waste Management and Minimisation Bylaw 2025. This will replace the Waste Bylaw 2017 which has been superseded by legislative changes and the new kerbside collection service.

Solid Waste Manager Mark Lucas says the new draft bylaw provides a mechanism for managing and minimising waste now and into the future.

“Marlborough is currently producing 1330kg of waste per person per year; the national average is 740kg. We cannot keep kicking this recyclable can down the road - as a region we can do more. Based on these figures we are not doing as well as we could be.”

“The changes to the bylaw are designed to give Council better control of the minority who are exploiting the system. The cost of their activities is borne by the community, most of whom are doing the right thing.”

Mr Lucas said Council wanted to double Marlborough’s recycling output and significantly reduce waste going to landfill. “Marlborough needs to reduce how much waste we send to landfill because our Bluegums facility has a limited life expectancy. Without a bylaw Council has no powers to regulate waste in our region,” he said.

“The cost of our Emissions Trading Scheme liability is also set to increase significantly, from $818K last year to around $2.3M this year and $2.6M from 2026. We need to work together to keep improving the way we deal with waste as costs continue to escalate.”

The new bylaw will also identify remote transfer stations as waste facilities, increase Council’s ability to deal with non-compliance at transfer stations and allow new rules to address problems caused by litter including around donation boxes for clothing and household goods. “Education will be our primary focus, not punitive action,” Mr Lucas told councillors.

A set of terms and conditions will sit separately to the bylaw to allow more flexibility as Council will be able to amend these, Mr Lucas said.

“There are also new requirements for waste management plans from industry which includes the building of multi-unit residential dwellings, and all commercial demolition and construction activities over $2M in value.”

“There is currently no threshold or trigger value for this quantum, and we have set ours based on research from other councils – we would like feedback on this proposal. When you consider that 40 to 50 per cent of waste going to landfill is from construction and demolition this is a good way to divert waste to reuse and recycling,” Mr Lucas said.

Large scale events are also an area Council would like feedback on.

At present all events in Marlborough require a waste minimisation plan but the new bylaw sets this at 500 people and is designed to capture major events, not smaller work or family celebrations.

Licensing requirements for waste operators will also be introduced to better monitor the effectiveness of the new bylaw.

“We welcome the input from the community and industry to ensure we set these trigger values correctly. More information will be made available on Council’s website once consultation begins,” Mr Lucas said.

Consultation on the Draft Waste Management and Minimisation Bylaw 2025 starts on 10 March and closes on 17 April. Hearings will be held on 14 May if they are required.

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