A councillor campaigning for a waste incinerator has dismissed as “propaganda” concerns raised about the controversial facility.
And Lisburn and Castlereagh Alderman David Drysdale, who chairs the Arc21 waste management group behind the plan, is warning that Northern Ireland is facing a waste ‘timebomb’ as countries we export our rubbish to start closing their doors to such imports.
The DUP elected rep also hit out at how millions of pounds in public money was spent defending legal challenges to the plant which was earmarked for a site in Mallusk.
Read more: Arc21 waste burner: Planning permission refused for incinerator in Newtownabbey.
Ald Drysdale was speaking ahead of fresh legal action in the coming weeks to get plans for the £240 million plant back on track.
In March 2022, the Arc21 application for the north Belfast area residual waste facility was refused by the then Infrastructure Minister Nichola Mallon (SDLP) despite approvals at council planning stage.
Also, in 2015, the then Environment Minister Mark H Durkan (SDLP) had previously refused the plans, with the decision later overturned in the courts.
The site, which could treat 300,000 tonnes of waste a year and provide energy to 30,000 homes, has faced 5,000 objections submitted against its application since 2014, on health and environmental grounds.
Legal representatives are now set to engage in the appeals process in the coming days with a decision expected to be in April.
In an interview with the Local Democracy Service, DUP Lisburn and Castlereagh Alderman David Drysdale, who is the chairperson of Arc21 has called on the ministers to be held accountable for the “abuse of ratepayers’ money”.
He said: “To date for the waste facility, we are talking about £20m in total being spent of which £8m is public money and £12m from the perferred bidder. Theses figures were teased out at Antrim and Newtownabbey Council.
“The breakdown of the public money is from DAERA and from the six individual councils as well as other departments, so it is a cocktail of funding, which started the whole ball rolling. The most of the £8m has been spent on legal fees, since 2015.
“In terms of contesting the ministers’ decisions we have spent a ball park figure of about £2m contesting it to date.”
Despite high rising costs for the facility proposal, an apparent apathy from elected members across the six council structure of Arc21 has seen low attendance at its regular monthly joint committee meetings.
The chairperson added: “One of my first roles as chair was to look at the attendance of meetings and I discovered that there were some councillors that had not been there for a nearly a year and some nearly up to two years.
“Given this is the second biggest budget in any council and is going to continue to grow, as there are lots of things coming down the pipeline, particularly around climate change, from Westminster and so-forth, so we need to find a way of getting rid of our waste.
“I’m not saying residual waste facilities are the answer, but it is the lesser of two evils compared to landfill. There is a lot of misinformation out there and there is a lot of work needed to educate people out there.
“If the DUP did get the minister’s role in a new Executive, I would be certainly be advocating that we do approve it. But then what happens is you go back to the business case, we’ll sit down with everybody, including the private sector.
“This is like the Battle of Britain, we need everybody on board and around the table, to manage the waste we are taking in.”
Last year, ahead of Minister Mallon’s decision, The BBC Spotlight programme investigated Arc21 and indicated that one of its six managed councils, Antrim and Newtownabbey, had indicated it had wanted to withdraw from the waste facility plans.
Alderman Drysdale said: “There are some on Antrim and Newtownabbey Council, who aren’t so keen, but they have never taken a vote on it. The council would gain about half a million pounds alone in rates, they have a golden goose sitting at their gates, but some would look to boil it.
“The Spotlight programme talked about leaving, but I haven’t seen anyone in Antrim and Newtownabbey Council standing up and saying, ‘right I want to take a vote on leaving Arc21’.
“It seems to be driven by certain individuals within it. I don’t know who they are or who is advising them."
Objections to the proposal have seen concerns over a potential decrease in household recycling and health fears linked to toxic fumes from the incinerator, though these have been dismissed by the Arc21 chair.
He said: “This is coming from those in a propaganda war and they put stuff out there that is proper Hans Christen Anderson stuff. You have to remember there are about 500 of these operating in Europe and there is no surprise that Germany and Austria lead the way. The regulations, around residual waste facilities are very, very strict.
“There is fear propaganda showing a green cloud over Newtownabbey, but let me tell you this all works off steam. A question was asked during a visit to a residual waste facility, about what are the toxins that go into the air?
“The response was that there were more from a firework display in one of our major cities for the next 10 years than there would be from one of our facilities.
“What sort of makes me smile, is that a lot of people who are nay sayers in all of this, the waste contractors they are using are sending their own residual waste down to incinerators the south of Ireland. So it is completely hypocritical.
“If other countries do close their doors like India has China has and other places around the world will, the problems are gathering and we need to take action. It’s going to come to 2030 and Westminster is going to say that no waste is to leave the shores here. In 20 years time, the youth of today will castigate us for putting this stuff into the ground.
“They’ll be digging it up to take it out, because the environmentalists in 20 years time will say that this was an appalling way to get rid of waste, and we are hearing that already.
“Yet where some councils are concerned, it is falling on deaf ears. I can understand the people living up there (in Mallusk) saying we don’t want this, but they have been fed a lot of wrong information.
“I am sympathetic to everybody, but there are a lot of things people don’t want beside them, but we have to have them. The refusal of the waste facility, is NIMBYism (not in my backyard), I don’t care what people say, it is NIMBYism pure and simple.
“What I would say, is that there has now been an abuse of ratepayers money of six councils by the former minister for rejecting this waste facility, that has been approved at every other stage, so will the Northern Ireland Office be holding anyone accountable?”
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