City Environment Modernisation Update: appendix 6

Performance report

Purpose of paper

This paper has been prepared to provide Members with an update on several elements of Cityclean performance as the City Environment Modernisation Programme has been designed to address many elements of service delivery. While there is some way to go, the information provided helps to demonstrate some of the progress made to date.

More information on the projects referred to can be found in Appendix 1.

Customer feedback and experience

	2019/20				2020/21
	Q1	Q2	Q3	Q4	Q1
Compliments	25	43	30	29	63
Stage 1 complaints	74	167	143	122	66
Stage 2 complaints	7	8	9	8	2

Feedback from customers and residents in quarter 1 2020/21 has provided a promising start to the financial year. The service has already received half the number of compliments in one quarter than it did for the whole of last year. While the number of complaints received in quarter 1 is similar to the same period last year, it is almost half the amount received in the preceding quarter. These results are really encouraging given the tough circumstances within which the service was operating during April to June.

Work will continue through the Modernisation Programme to improve the customer experience and sustain these customer feedback results, including:

· Reviewing and finding solutions for persistent missed collections through the Customer Experience Project to reduce the incidence of continual missed collections

· Investing in IT systems to enable improvements to service delivery through technology, including improvements to how information is received and shared with residents

In addition, other projects have been designed to improve resident, business and visitor perceptions of the city, including:

· Commercial bins on the highway

· Communal bin system

· Graffiti reduction

· Weed management

Percentage of household waste sent for reuse, recycling and composting

Year	Percentage
2016/17	27%
2017/18	28.6%
2018/19	29.2%
2019/20	29.5%

While there was only a small increase in the percentage of waste sent for reuse, recycling and composting, many projects within the Modernisation Programme are designed to increase this:

· The Managing Waste Responsibly Project is improving how the council communicates with and educates the city on recycling

· The rollout of more recycling wheelie bins will enable residents to recycle more

· The Keeping the City Clean Review is redesigning the service so it is reliable and resilient to ensure collections are made on the scheduled day, removing the need for recycling materials to be placed in refuse containers if the collection is missed

· The food waste appraisal is looking at options to increase the recycling rate by redirecting food waste away from the residual waste stream

Furthermore, the expansion of the garden waste service will ensure more waste is sent for composting. Cityclean has recently started some waste composition analysis to better understand the types of waste in the refuse stream to develop targeted projects and communication to ensure the right waste is placed in the right container.

Missed collections

Quarter	Missed refuse collections per 100,000 collections	Missed recycling collections per 100,000 collections
April to March 2019	171	337
April to June 2019	159	444
April to September 2019	402	992
April to December 2019	354	852
April to March 2020	395	1089

The missed refuse collection rate has increased slightly in the most recent reporting period, though is down from its highest point last year.

Unfortunately, the missed recycling collection rate continues to increase. Responding to the Covid-19 situation had an impact towards the latter part of quarter 4 as collections were suspended from 23/03/2020 to 27/03/2020, with limited collections from 28/03/2020 to 03/04/2020 while the service prioritised refuse over recycling for public health reasons. Missed collections continued to be reported during this time and have been included in the figures.

Also, for both refuse and recycling, responding to the Covid-19 situation impacted on collections towards the latter part of quarter 4. With a significant number of staff in self-isolation, agency staff were deployed to cover rounds who were not as familiar with routes. Furthermore, social distancing measures meant rounds were taking longer to complete, resulting in some work not being completed and leading to missed work.

Projects within the Modernisation Programme are designed to address the poor service in relation to missed collections.

· The Keeping the City Clean Review is redesigning the service, so it is reliable and resilient to ensure collections are made on the scheduled day

· Reviewing and finding solutions for persistent missed collections through the Customer Experience Project will reduce the incidence of continual missed collections from occurring

· Investing in IT systems will enable improvements to service delivery through technology through real-time information being sent to crews

Percentage of municipal waste landfilled

Year	Percentage
2016/17	4.9%
2017/18	5.3%
2018/19	4.0%
2019/20	2.5%

Disposal of waste to landfill is the least favourable treatment option in terms of environmental impact and cost. Residual waste is generally only disposed to landfill if it cannot be processed by facilities higher up the waste hierarchy, which tends to be composite bulky waste. Brighton & Hove continues to perform well in terms of the low volume of waste which is sent to landfill. For context, in 2018/19, 10.8% of waste from local authorities across England was sent to landfill. For Brighton & Hove, residual waste is sent to the Energy Recovery Facility in Newhaven where it is converted into electricity to power over 25,000 homes.

Cityclean continues to explore any new opportunities with Veolia to reduce the amount of residual waste sent to landfill further.

Residual waste

Year	Residual waste per household
2016/17	601.9kg
2017/18	575.1kg
2018/19	561.3kg
2019/20	552.3kg

The volume of residual waste continues to reduce slightly. Again, many projects within the Modernisation Programme are designed to reduce the amount of residual waste produced in Brighton & Hove:

· The Managing Waste Responsibly Project is improving how the council communicates with and educates the city on recycling. Activities are designed to ensure each type of waste goes in the right waste stream

· The rollout of more recycling wheelie bins will enable residents to recycle more

· The Keeping the City Clean Review is redesigning the service, so it is reliable and resilient to ensure collections are made on the scheduled day, removing the need for recycling materials to be placed in refuse containers if the collection is missed

· The food waste appraisal is looking at options to decrease volume of food waste in the residual waste stream

The expansion of the garden waste service means less green waste should be treated as residual waste.

Vehicles off road

Quarter	Percentage of vehicles off road
Q4 2019/20	15.87%
Q1 2020/21	11.45%
Q2 2020/21 to 21/08/2020	11.18%

Through improvements via the Operator’s Licence Project and through the Fleet Replacement Programme, the number of vehicles off road continues to decrease. While this is not yet reflected in a reduction of missed collections, it is a move in the right direction. This improvement is having a positive impact on other areas of the service including a reduction in expenditure. These two pieces of work will continue, alongside other modernisation activities, to improve many elements of service delivery.