Best Public Private Partnership goes to Greater Manchester

Greater Manchester celebrated winning a prestigious award for its innovative Recycling and Waste Management Contract at the Municipal Journal Achievement Awards.

The Greater Manchester Waste Disposal Authority (GMWDA) with its partners Viridor Laing (Greater Manchester) Ltd (VLGM), and the nine Greater Manchester Waste Collection Authorities (WCAs) of Bolton, Bury, Manchester, Oldham, Rochdale, Salford, Stockport, Tameside and Trafford came top for Public Private Partnership.

The Greater Manchester partnership demonstrated to the judges’ leadership and excellent management of a complex and challenging partnership, delivering outstanding efficiency and service improvements for its 25-year Contract.

Significant achievements have been delivered across the Greater Manchester partnership including:

• A 366,000 tonne reduction in Local Authority Collected Waste from 2004/05 to 2010/11
• An increase in recycling and composting to 37.01% in 2010/11
• A reduction in waste sent to landfill by 483,000 tonnes from 2004/05 to 2010/11

The awards celebrate the hard work, determination and innovation delivered by local authorities up and down the country. There were a record number of entries this year, demonstrating the excellent services and innovation being delivered at a time of budget savings.

Councillor Swannick from the Greater Manchester Waste Disposal Authority (GMWDA) said: “We are delighted to have won this award as recognition for the hard work and dedication of a whole range of cross cutting partners including; VLGM, Viridor, our Waste Collection Authorities, community organisations, and of course residents in Greater Manchester. Together the partnership is dedicated to achieving our ambitious targets of at least 50% recycling and composting and at least 75% diversion from landfill. With this support we can achieve our aim of zero waste to landfill.”