Three Kent councils have signed a new waste and recycling contract with SUEZ Recycling and Recovery UK Ltd.
Ashford, Maidstone and Swale councils – which work together as the Mid Kent Waste Partnership, have awarded the eight-year contract to SUEZ after a detailed joint tender process. The new waste contract, which will begin in March 2024, will introduce new technology and
industry improvements, whilst retaining large parts of the existing service.
The three partner councils have worked hard over the last two years to get this new contract in place. Suez provided a strong bid, showing enthusiasm to deliver the service and bringing their considerable industry experience to Mid Kent. A new fleet of vehicles will be purchased including more smaller and narrow access vehicles. With it comes improved technology for vehicle tracking and the management of customer
service requests, allowing the waste management team to have full visibility of the service and to lower the services’ carbon footprint. The new contract will also offer the chance to increase recycling rates across the three boroughs, provide improved efficiency of the collection routes, lower emissions vehicles and better technology to keep our residents up to date. The new contract includes proposed improvements to the level of cleansing in rural and residential areas, as well as quicker response times to the removal of fly-tipping.
Cllr Round, lead member for Environmental Services, commented:
"The three partner councils have worked hard over the last couple of years to get this new contract in place. MBC is pleased to continue to work with Ashford and Swale to deliver what is our biggest contract, and Suez provided a strong bid, showing enthusiasm to deliver the service bringing their considerable industry experience to Mid Kent. The new vehicles are being funded directly by each council and will help save costs. They will be modern and use electric bin lifts which will reduce the consumption of diesel dramatically, helping lower the services’ carbon footprint.
The new contract will also offer the chance to increase recycling rates across the three boroughs, improved efficiency of the collection routes, lower emissions vehicles and better technology to keep our residents up to date."
In short, we expect a huge improvement of service from March 2024. Please continue to report missed bins via the MBC website:
https://self.maidstone.gov.uk/service/report_a_missed_bin_collection
