THE final phase of the roll-out of Recycle More will go ahead next year – even though a depot handling much of the material may not be ready in time.

The Somerset Waste Partnership (SWP) has been rolling out Recycle More across the county, entailing more items to be recycled at the kerbside and refuse collections moving to once every three weeks.

Following the roll-outs in Mendip (phase one), South Somerset (phase two) and the former Taunton Deane area (phase three), the SWP has announced its intention to push forward as planned with the final phase on February 28, 2022, which will cover Sedgemoor and the former West Somerset area.

However, it has admitted that work to upgrade the Williton depot may not be completed until June 2022 – meaning trucks will have to shuttle back and forth into West Somerset from other locations for the first four months of the programme.

Somerset County Gazette: Williton Recycling Depot On The Roughmoor Industrial Estate. CREDIT: Google Maps. Free to use for all BBC wire partners.

An update on the Recycle More roll-out came before a meeting of the Somerset Waste Board joint scrutiny panel on Wednesday afternoon (December 8).

SWP managing director Mickey Green said in his written report: “The upgrade of the Williton depot will not be completed until around June, with work starting in January.

“This is due to the disruption to supply chains internationally, which are hampering construction project time-lines.

“Suez [the Recycle More contractor] has now de-coupled the depot construction time-line from the roll-out timetable – effectively with trucks being shunted back and forth from Williton until it is upgraded, and with additional temporary vehicle parking near the existing depot.”

The Williton depot lies on the Roughmoor Industrial Estate, near the village’s recycling centre and a short distance from the West Somerset Railway.

Mr Green said that there were risks posed by this course of action, but it was a better scenario than delaying the final phase of the roll-out until the summer of 2022.

A total of 72,312 households will receive the new Recycle More service under phase four – with around two-thirds seeing their collection days change.

There has been a rise in missed collections since the roll-out begin, with the SWP struggling to deal with both the ongoing coronavirus pandemic and the national HGV driver shortage.

Councillor Brian Hamilton, who represents Ilminster on South Somerset District Council, said more should be done to alert residents if their collections had been missed.

He said: “I had a report from one of my residents saying they saw the recycle lorry with staff having their tea and coffee, and then they drove past without picking up their recycling.

“Can staff put a card through a door or apologise in person to those people whose waste can’t be collected on a given day?”

Mr Green replied: “I’ll take that one away and have a think. The automated system does that – if you tried to report a missed collection, it would tell you when they’d return.

“There have been particular issues in the Chard and Ilminster area in the last little while. It hasn’t gone as smoothly as we wanted.”