Councils win permission for JR over withdrawn PFI credits for waste project

The High Court has given two Yorkshire councils leave to bring a judicial review of a decision by DEFRA to withdraw £62.1m of private finance initiative credits from the authorities’ waste project.

The project put together by Bradford and Calderdale councils involved the construction of a new waste treatment plant in Bradford that would have processed 193,000 tonnes of waste per year.

The Government funding was worth more than £120m over the 25-year lifetime of the project.

Bradford and Calderdale said they were seeking “a reconsideration of DEFRA’s decision on lawful and properly informed grounds”.

The two authorities claimed that it was now known that DEFRA had been reviewing its support for a number of waste projects in November 2012. They said that costs of around £2.7m could have been avoided if they had been told about this review at the time.

Bradford estimated that it had already spent about £5m on the project, including the enabling and utility works on site. It said it was “just months away from completing the contracts for the project when DEFRA withdrew its PFI credits without any warning”.

Cllr Andrew Thornton, Bradford Council's Executive Member for Environment and Sport, said: “We welcome the High Court granting us permission for the judicial review.

“By its withdrawal of the waste PFI credits at the eleventh hour DEFRA pulled the rug from under our long-term solution for dealing with the district's waste in a sustainable way. This project would have diverted almost all of our waste away from landfill in the face of rising landfill taxes.

“This is why we felt we had no choice but to challenge DEFRA’s decision through the courts.”

Calderdale Council’s Leader, Cllr Tim Swift, said: “It’s pleasing that the court agrees with us that there is a case to be heard. DEFRA’s decision left us with no option but to apply for a judicial review.

"The investment in a new waste treatment plant should have led to major savings for council tax payers in both local authorities, yet instead we are now left with major costs and the need to find an alternative solution for our waste.”

DEFRA has previously defended the decision to withdraw PFI credits from a range of waste projects on the basis that its investment of £3.6bn in 29 waste infrastructure projects would enable the UK to meet the EU target of reducing waste sent to landfill.