Is the DTI going weak over waste?

The DTI's decision over the disposal of WEEE has left channel players in the dark

There is nothing worse than staring defeat in the eyes just when you thought victory was yours.

In a Manchester United versus Accrington Stanley-type battle, The Independent Trade Association of Computing Specialists (Itacs) has finally secured a meeting with the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI), regarding what it sees as the disproportionate costs of the Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) directive affecting small companies.

The meeting itself could be seen as a triumph, of sorts – opening lines of communications with the DTI is a gargantuan task in itself, let alone securing a meeting with the DTI director and the assistant director for WEEE, as Itacs did.

However, the actual outcome of the meeting was far from victorious. Although certain rules and regulations surrounding the disorganised directive were clarified – for example, the DTI confirmed that any assembler of a PC is a producer and should be registered as such – other, more vital and damaging, factors were brushed aside.

There was hope from our industry and Itacs that the DTI would allow SMEs to take their waste kit back to their local civic amenity site. However, it transpired that the DTI has less oomph than an asthmatic fairy smoking a cigarette.

The DTI has now claimed that each local authority will decide its own policy on whether or not to permit WEEE into its amenity site.

So, Itacs must now ask every local authority what its policy is and then communicate this to our industry. With about 500 councils in the UK this is a phenomenal task and one that the DTI should have completed itself a long time ago.

If SMEs are to be penalised through WEEE and if the DTI continues to shirk responsibility, it remains up to our industry to help ourselves to this information and hound every local authority for its policy until all the results are in.