:37:59. > :38:00.Hello and welcome to the Politics Show in the South West. The row
:38:01. > :38:03.over making weekly rubbish collections compulsory created a
:38:03. > :38:06.bit of a stink in Westminster this week. Local Government Secretary
:38:06. > :38:08.Eric Pickles had previously championed the cause. But when the
:38:08. > :38:11.Government published its Waste Review on Tuesday, the idea had
:38:11. > :38:13.been chucked into the dustcart. The Waste Review talks about advising
:38:14. > :38:17.local authorities to carry out more frequent collections but Ministers
:38:17. > :38:20.accept they can't force them to do so. At the same time the Government
:38:20. > :38:24.wants to encourage businesses as well as households to recycle more.
:38:24. > :38:30.John Danks reports. For any government trying to become
:38:30. > :38:35.the greenest, landfill is that dirty word they all try to avoid.
:38:35. > :38:37.Keeping rubbish out of the ground is foremost in DEFRA's Waste Review.
:38:37. > :38:44.Getting businesses to buy into this ethos isn't difficult because the
:38:45. > :38:47.more they throw away the more they pay in landfill tax. Darts Farm in
:38:48. > :38:53.Topsham has made great strides in reducing the waste it throws out.
:38:53. > :38:56.They separate plastics and cardboard for recycling. With the
:38:56. > :39:03.cost of waste collection constantly rising, they've found it pays to
:39:04. > :39:08.recycle. The cardboard is bulky stuff and we spend a lot of money
:39:08. > :39:13.every month paying to get our general waste taken off side. The
:39:13. > :39:18.more we can get recycled, we get an income from that cardboard so we
:39:18. > :39:21.are turning what would be a cost into where revenue. The price of
:39:21. > :39:25.recyclable materials fluctuates but a lorry load of cardboard can fetch
:39:25. > :39:29.around �1,500. No surprise maybe then that a DEFRA survey of
:39:29. > :39:32.commercial waste last year revealed a recycling rate of 52%. But for
:39:32. > :39:39.some small businesses access to waste and recycling services is a
:39:39. > :39:41.problem. For a start not all local authorities collect trade waste. Of
:39:41. > :39:45.the various disposal authorities throughout Devon and Cornwall just
:39:45. > :39:47.over 60% offer commercial waste and recycling services. It was
:39:47. > :39:52.announced in the Waste Review that the Landfill Allowance Trading
:39:52. > :40:02.Scheme would be abolished. This set a limit on how much authorities
:40:02. > :40:02.
:40:02. > :40:06.could send to landfill. It takes away one of the incentives for
:40:06. > :40:11.local-authority is not to deal with trade waste collection and
:40:11. > :40:16.recycling because that tended to count against our allocations.
:40:17. > :40:23.Because we might have had to buy permits to cover that, it should
:40:23. > :40:27.make it much cheaper and efficient for small and medium-sized
:40:28. > :40:35.businesses to do far more recycling of the materials that they haven't
:40:35. > :40:37.their waste bins. -- that they have in their waste bins. The review
:40:37. > :40:40.also proposed that Household Waste Recycling Centres might be adapted
:40:40. > :40:42.to accept business waste. An idea which Plymouth City Council and
:40:42. > :40:47.Cornwall Council will consider if cost effective. Devon County
:40:47. > :40:50.Council has it's doubts. difficulty is that we have sized
:40:50. > :40:57.than for the household waste streams and if you start taking in
:40:57. > :41:03.large chunks of extra waste, you end up with queues and delays
:41:03. > :41:10.because the units are generally pretty small. They are constrained
:41:10. > :41:14.by the size of the site. Councils will said about providing the right
:41:14. > :41:19.service that ratepayers once and the best service. This is a local
:41:19. > :41:24.issue and must be decided at a local level. What we want in our
:41:24. > :41:30.waste review is to make it easier for people to reduce waste, recycle,
:41:31. > :41:35.see their waste go to other uses and so on. We want to get it all
:41:35. > :41:37.out of landfill. But the review has been slammed by critics for lacking
:41:37. > :41:39.ambition and detail. Labour's shadow environment secretary said
:41:39. > :41:42.the government's policies on rubbish were in chaos. Meanwhile
:41:42. > :41:47.the government claim they're still on track for achieving a zero waste
:41:47. > :41:56.economy. But to reach that goal it seems local authorities have been
:41:56. > :42:02.left to do much of the dirty work. I'm joined by a waste expert from
:42:02. > :42:06.the University of Plymouth. He has also stirred as a Green Party
:42:06. > :42:09.candidate. We have a government that wants to be the greenest ever
:42:09. > :42:17.and zero waste. In your view, is this report doing anything to
:42:17. > :42:20.advance those goals? It is full of good intentions. It is a fairly
:42:20. > :42:28.smooth continuation of a long process that has been going on for
:42:28. > :42:32.several decades but it very much prefers to consider incentives and
:42:32. > :42:36.it is moving away from targets, particularly forcing people to do
:42:36. > :42:41.things. That is at the heart of this Government's philosophy all
:42:41. > :42:47.round. It is an idea that is being tested in all kinds of areas. Some
:42:47. > :42:49.people would suggest there is a conflict between on the one hand
:42:49. > :42:55.encouragingly weekly rubbish collections and encouraging more
:42:55. > :43:00.recycling. Is that your view? a matter of emphasis. I can see for
:43:00. > :43:05.political reasons why they wanted to make an effort to go back to
:43:05. > :43:09.weekly collection but the real emphasis, they know, is the better
:43:09. > :43:14.management of our resources as a country. Just simply stopping
:43:14. > :43:17.throwing things away in a hole in the ground. They have kept with
:43:17. > :43:22.that commitment. They are attempting to rationalise and
:43:22. > :43:29.improve recycling. They then are trying to ensure the best energy
:43:29. > :43:32.recovery. Do you think they largely incentive based policy can work on
:43:32. > :43:38.its own? Do we need more of the stick that the Labour government
:43:38. > :43:44.introduced? I think that some of the freeing up of opportunities is
:43:44. > :43:50.a good thing. It is difficult to say with the land full allowance
:43:50. > :43:53.trading scheme, which is being scrapped, that set targets for the
:43:53. > :43:58.total amount of waste being generated by councils. They are
:43:58. > :44:05.arguing that in fact the landfill tax, which is now moving up to that
:44:05. > :44:09.�80 per tonne target, is sufficient in itself. Maybe that is the case
:44:09. > :44:16.but I have been pleased to see that they are already encouraging
:44:16. > :44:20.anaerobic digestion and they have made some intelligent pointers to
:44:20. > :44:24.the way things that things could go for it, albeit they are not taking
:44:24. > :44:29.a front seat in forcing it to happen. Arabic the suggestion of
:44:29. > :44:34.course deals with food waste, which is a big component of domestic
:44:34. > :44:40.waste. -- and a row brick by gesture. The government is also
:44:40. > :44:46.looking at excluding VAT from landfill. How do you see that
:44:46. > :44:50.working at? In Plymouth for instance, they are committed to an
:44:50. > :44:54.incinerator and it is the cheapest, dirtiest way of dealing with it but
:44:54. > :45:00.it does deal with it. It avoids expensive separate food waste
:45:00. > :45:05.collection which I would like to see. I think that the big plus that
:45:05. > :45:12.you can get from separate food waste collection is you can put it
:45:12. > :45:16.through digestion and can recover gas. And what this report for the
:45:16. > :45:23.first time says, is we could be supplying up to one-fifth of
:45:23. > :45:28.domestic gas from the digestion of this kind of waste. That is
:45:28. > :45:32.incredibly important when we are seeing the rising price of gas from
:45:32. > :45:37.natural... From the road non- renewable resources, to move
:45:37. > :45:43.towards a situation where we are supplying our gas these from away
:45:43. > :45:46.waste food, that is good stuff. we are now going to have an
:45:46. > :45:50.incinerator in Plymouth. I think that is right and it is a problem
:45:50. > :45:55.certainly. But at least it avoids it going to landfill. At the moment,
:45:55. > :45:59.we've got a huge amount of her mother's waist, which cannot be
:45:59. > :46:03.recycled, and after all they are below 40 % in their current
:46:03. > :46:10.recycling, so that means that more than 60 % of the waste from
:46:10. > :46:15.Plymouth is trundling in trucks, 15 or 20 miles down the road every day.
:46:16. > :46:18.We are going to have to leave it there. Thank you very much. A South
:46:18. > :46:22.West MP wants the Government to help a taxi driver from Cornwall
:46:22. > :46:24.who's been in an African prison for the last three years. Whilst living
:46:25. > :46:27.in Gambia, where he was building a retirement home, Stephen Scarlett
:46:28. > :46:30.drove three men over the border into Senegal. When they arrived all
:46:31. > :46:34.four were convicted of visa fraud and Mr Scarlett's been in prison
:46:34. > :46:38.there ever since. Tamsin Melville has been talking to his wife who
:46:38. > :46:41.lives near Redruth. Jackie Scarlett's hopes have been
:46:41. > :46:46.raised and dashed many times during her fight to get husband Stephen
:46:46. > :46:52.released from a Senegal jail. His sentence ended in February but he's
:46:52. > :46:55.still behind bars. The latest court hearing was earlier this week.
:46:55. > :47:05.During our interview at her home near Redruth, Jackie took a call
:47:05. > :47:12.
:47:12. > :47:22.from the Foreign Office with some news. Yeah, yeah. All right, I will
:47:22. > :47:23.
:47:23. > :47:26.talk to you again soon. Goodbye. It has been rejected again. I'm sorry.
:47:26. > :47:29.For the family, various holidays to the Gambia had been very happy
:47:29. > :47:35.which is why Stephen decided to build a retirement home there. Now
:47:35. > :47:40.the dream has turned into a nightmare. I have had no help at
:47:40. > :47:48.all apart from I just keep ringing places and hope to be heard. There
:47:48. > :47:52.have been doing it for three years, tried to get somewhere. The three
:47:52. > :47:54.men also jailed have already been released but one is said to be
:47:54. > :47:57.claiming he was a victim and is paying the Senegalese authorities
:47:57. > :47:59.to keep Stephen imprisoned. He's asking for compensation, which
:47:59. > :48:02.Jackie simply cannot afford. She hasn't spoken to her husband for
:48:02. > :48:12.two years and has received only three letters, the last of which
:48:12. > :48:36.
:48:36. > :48:42.It is just not Steve. He is very cold, I'm alright, I'm fine. Don't
:48:42. > :48:47.worry about me, look after yourself. That is all he says. What his state
:48:47. > :48:53.of mind is, I don't know. I have no idea what kind of man is going to
:48:53. > :48:56.come back home. It will certainly not Biedermann but went. Jackie's
:48:56. > :49:03.MP took her fight to the Commons this week, calling for financial
:49:03. > :49:08.assistance in cases like this, prompting this Government response.
:49:08. > :49:12.I understand the distress felt by Mr Scarlett and his family, and the
:49:12. > :49:17.length of time his cases taken to resolve. He has been assisted by
:49:17. > :49:22.the British Embassy and the Foreign and Commonwealth Office as a whole.
:49:22. > :49:26.The responsibility of assuring Mr Scarlett receives his best possible
:49:26. > :49:31.outcome rests with his lawyer. The Foreign Office supports and part
:49:31. > :49:35.funds three groups, Prisoners abroad, reprieve and fair trials
:49:35. > :49:37.International, all of which assist British citizens. We are aware that
:49:37. > :49:40.Fair trials International have offered their services to Mr
:49:40. > :49:43.scarlets family. But Jackie says they couldn't even find an English
:49:43. > :49:46.speaking lawyer from a list they were given and Fair Trials
:49:46. > :49:53.International haven't been able to help. There's a reason for this
:49:53. > :49:59.says their man at the top. government has offices, staff,
:49:59. > :50:03.consulates all over the world. A charity like Fair trials
:50:03. > :50:06.International has received only �15,000 from the government in the
:50:06. > :50:09.last year. It is nowhere near enough money to provide the kind of
:50:09. > :50:15.support that is needed. And he says they're reliant on Foreign office
:50:15. > :50:22.assistance. It is difficult to understand why he is continuing to
:50:22. > :50:25.be held and what the Basic Law is in Senegal on this point. We've
:50:25. > :50:29.asked the British government to gather that information so we can
:50:29. > :50:34.provide some answers to Mr Scarlett and his family in Cornwall and to
:50:34. > :50:37.consider whether we can challenge his treatment at the UN or other
:50:37. > :50:40.international fora, but that have has not been forthcoming from the
:50:40. > :50:43.British government. And the Government's answers aren't enough
:50:43. > :50:50.for others either, with calls for legal aid rights at home to cross
:50:50. > :50:53.borders in cases like Stephen's.? In extreme cases, we should offer
:50:53. > :50:58.financial assistance because there is a big difference between fact
:50:58. > :51:01.and somebody who is going on holiday, gets in a brawl and ends
:51:01. > :51:05.up in trouble with the local police. There are distinctions between
:51:05. > :51:09.those kinds of cases. There are only two British citizens in prison
:51:09. > :51:13.in Senegal and in these countries they have a very different legal
:51:13. > :51:17.system two hours. I don't think it would break the bank because the
:51:17. > :51:24.numbers in these situations is small. Back in Cornwall it's a
:51:24. > :51:30.struggle to keep the hope alive. feel dead inside because I just
:51:31. > :51:34.don't know what door and going to knock on next. I just don't know
:51:34. > :51:38.what I'm going to do. Jackie Scarlett ending that report
:51:38. > :51:41.from Tamsin Melville. We did request an interview with the
:51:41. > :51:44.Foreign Office Minister and Taunton Deane MP, Jeremy Browne, but he
:51:44. > :51:47.declined. The MP for South East Cornwall has
:51:47. > :51:49.once again called on the Government to abandon its plans to close
:51:49. > :51:52.coastguard stations. Sheryll Murray's husband died in a fishing
:51:52. > :52:01.accident earlier this year, and she made an emotional plea in the
:52:02. > :52:05.Commons this week. No one knows more than me how dangerous the sea
:52:05. > :52:12.is and how important it is to co- ordinate all rescue services
:52:12. > :52:18.locally, when an incident occurs at sea. If these -- in these proposals,
:52:18. > :52:27.I'm reminded of 1994, when two fishermen lost their lives of the
:52:27. > :52:31.Cornish coast. It was below a recently closed... In reply, the
:52:31. > :52:36.Shipping Minister Mike Penning insisted change is essential.
:52:36. > :52:39.Parties can play politics with this but we will come out of this with
:52:40. > :52:43.an emergency service which has the resilience nationally that it
:52:43. > :52:48.deserves and the pay and training infrastructure that the service
:52:48. > :52:51.needs as well. I hope that everybody understands that. The
:52:51. > :53:01.government is doing this for the right reasons, not just about cuts,
:53:01. > :53:03.
:53:03. > :53:05.it is because... What we need is a 24/7 -- a 21st century service.
:53:05. > :53:10.Transport Select Committee will deliver a report on the proposals
:53:10. > :53:14.this Thursday. When the Government came to power
:53:14. > :53:17.last year it promised to cut red tape for business. Here in the
:53:17. > :53:19.South West there are few bigger businesses than tourism. But people
:53:20. > :53:22.working in the self catering sector fear they're now facing more
:53:22. > :53:25.expensive and complicated regulation. John Ayres reports.
:53:25. > :53:32.Flick through a holiday cottage brochure and what are you looking
:53:32. > :53:37.for? Nice accommodation, good location that's quite and peaceful,
:53:37. > :53:41.maybe near to a town or a beach, maybe you want to take a dog? But
:53:41. > :53:44.energy efficiency? Here's the thing. Apparently the Government hasn't
:53:44. > :53:48.been correctly applying its own laws on holiday lets, to brings it
:53:48. > :53:51.in line with Europe and now they're putting it right. From the end of
:53:51. > :53:54.this month, a Energy Performance Certificate which is one of those
:53:54. > :53:57.things you have to get when you sell your house, will have to be
:53:57. > :53:59.produced, and its details made available to propective customers.
:53:59. > :54:02.Ian Sturt carrys out energy assements. The information he
:54:02. > :54:09.collects will be made availaible to anyone wanting to take a holiday in
:54:09. > :54:12.this property. They are aware of how energy efficient the building
:54:12. > :54:16.is and then they can make a statement in terms of choosing to
:54:16. > :54:19.rent properties that are more environmentally friendly. It is
:54:19. > :54:23.freedom of choice and giving them the information to make that.
:54:23. > :54:26.Possibly more significant is the fact the energy performances have
:54:26. > :54:30.occurred produce for the owner of the property is going to indicate
:54:30. > :54:35.to them how they can improve the efficiency and reduce the energy
:54:35. > :54:39.waste. The EPC certificate costs between �50 and �80. So what's the
:54:39. > :54:42.problem? Well Moray Bowater runs a agency marketing properties like
:54:42. > :54:47.this and he's concerned about putting all this information in
:54:47. > :54:51.their literature. It may well increase the size of the brochure,
:54:51. > :54:55.maybe 10 or more pages. That will cost be up to �50,000 to increase
:54:55. > :55:01.the pressure by that amount. The mailing cost of the extra paper
:55:01. > :55:05.could cost us may be �70 -- �70,000 to �80,000 a year. We estimated
:55:05. > :55:09.will cost us in the region of �100,000 a year to add these
:55:09. > :55:12.details to our brochure and to the details that we send out to
:55:12. > :55:14.prospective ranters. Now the Government promised it would cut
:55:14. > :55:17.red tape for business. This week, the Conservative MP Andrew
:55:17. > :55:23.Stephenson, who represents Pendle in Lancashire raised the issue in
:55:23. > :55:28.the commons, and was supported by Anne Marie Morris from Newton Abbot.
:55:28. > :55:32.This is a classic case of the UK gold plating EU rate elation,
:55:32. > :55:36.something which ministers have promised to stop. For the avoidance
:55:36. > :55:40.of any confusion, I understand that the details state that all
:55:40. > :55:46.buildings are subjected to these regulations unless specifically
:55:46. > :55:50.excluded. As holiday lets have been -- not been excluded, it must apply
:55:50. > :55:53.to them. Effectively, this is going to become a tax on tourism and it
:55:53. > :55:58.will be harder to enforce because a lot of these lettings are not done
:55:58. > :56:02.through agencies. That, combined with the Finance Bill changes which
:56:02. > :56:06.changes the categorisation for relief, is going to give holiday
:56:06. > :56:10.lettings, small businesses a real problem. An important part of what
:56:10. > :56:16.my department attempts to do is to bust barriers and barrier busting
:56:16. > :56:20.is one of the things on which we you wax very eloquently. But it has
:56:20. > :56:25.to be the case that United Kingdom government must comply with EU
:56:25. > :56:29.legislation correctly interpreted, and it also has to be the case that
:56:29. > :56:32.it is extremely important to reduce the carbon output of the United
:56:32. > :56:38.Kingdom. But while the MInister talks about barrier busting, the
:56:38. > :56:42.industry is still to be convinved. It is a first test of whether this
:56:42. > :56:47.government is serious about supporting business and driving out
:56:47. > :56:51.red tape. It is the symbolism of a government helping business because
:56:51. > :56:54.if they look at this, they will realise it is not needed. Under the
:56:54. > :56:59.Government's own statements it should not happen. There's another
:56:59. > :57:02.issue here too. The EPC legislation is designed for tenancies but will
:57:02. > :57:10.now be applied to holiday lets. The industry fears this could be the
:57:10. > :57:14.thin end of the wedge. There are different rules, regulations and
:57:14. > :57:17.laws associated with shorthold or longer tenancies and those rules do
:57:17. > :57:23.not apply to holiday lets. Of course, holiday lets could not go
:57:23. > :57:26.ahead if the tenancy rules applied. Applying for work tenancy to
:57:26. > :57:29.holiday next undermines the whole basis of a holiday letting industry.
:57:29. > :57:33.The deadline to comply with the new application of the law is the 30th
:57:33. > :57:38.June, and applies to any property rented out for more than 20 weeks a