The Sinfin Incinerator project is controversial.

A joint project between Derby City Council and Derbyshire County Council has thus far failed to deliver and has already resulted in a termination payment of £93.5m made in July 2023, by both Councils, to the contractor, Resource Recovery Solutions (Derbyshire) Ltd.

Prior to the change of leadership at Derby City Council, the position of the Tory administration was to seek a new contractor to commission and run the plant. Whilst this process continues, the policy of the Labour administration, since May 2023, has been to ensure that the Plant never opens.

Derbyshire County Council is in conflict with Derby Council; it wants the Plant to be completed and to operate. County is so confident that the Plant will be fully commisioned that it has capitalised it’s £57m termination cost contribution. This also avoids further depletion of its scarce reserves.

The partnership arrangement between the two Councils is embodied in the Inter-Authority Agreement (IAA). The most recent version, IAA3, promoted by Derby City Council’s previous, Tory administration, remains unsigned by Derbyshire County Council. Rumour has it that Derby City Council has signed it.

In any case, whether the Plant is fully commissioned and operational is subject to a positive business case even if there has been a full resolution of the challenging technical issues. The business case for the Plant was always very marginal even when it was planned to be processing 190,000 tonnes of waste per year. Whether the Plant will ever be profitable is a serious question that needs to be answered – this is public money.

This leaves Derbyshire County Council with a major financial dilemma, on top of the £30m “black hole” in their 2023/24 finances which will see them perilously close to going “bust” ( known as a s114 notice)

Derbyshire County Council – on the verge of going bust!

An opportunity for Derbyshire County Council is the City Council’s political antipathy towards the Plant; could the City be considered to be in breach of the IAA?

Derby News submitted a Freedom of Information Request (FOI) to Derbyshire County Council:

“Could you please forward copies of all invoices issued by Derbyshire County Council to Derby City Council for charges made by County to City in respect of the Sinfin Incinerator Project (Derby and Derbyshire Waste Treatment Centre) between 1 April 2023 and 31 March 2024.”

Note: Derby City Council does receive invoices from County for a variety of operational services including school placements, bus concessions, waste disposal etc – all of which are publicly disclosed under the transaprency regulations on Derby City Council’s website. There are some minor charges relating to the “Sinfin Waste Plant”.

Derbyshire County Council, in a letter from the Director of Legal and Democratic Services ( not from the FOI team), refused to answer the FOI citing:

The Council confirms that it holds the requested information, but considers that the information is confidential in nature, and therefore the exception under Reg. 12(5)(e) of the EIR 2004 (confidentiality of commercial or industrial information) is engaged.

Under the Information Commision (ICO) rules the exception can only be invoked if:

“The exception can be broken down into a four-stage test. All four elements are required in order for the exception to be engaged:

• The information is commercial or industrial in nature.
• Confidentiality is provided by law.
• The confidentiality is protecting a legitimate economic interest.
• The confidentiality would be adversely affected by disclosure.”

The County’s solicitor must have concluded that invoices issued by County to City, in respect of the Sinfin Incinerator Project, were commercial in nature, and were in support of a “legitimate economic interest” and that non-disclosure was necessary to protect such an economic interest.

The letter goes on to say:

Whilst there is a general public interest in transparency and accountability, I consider the public interest in withholding the information outweighs the public interest in disclosure. This is because disclosure of the information will have an adverse effect on the ability of the Councils to conduct business between themselves and in accordance with the terms of the contract that is in place.

The question is why should County be so protective of charges made by itself, as a public body, to another public body, on a public project when the termination payment of £93.5m to a third party commercial interest was publicly disclosed in July 2023.

Opinion

Derbyshire County Council is in a desperate position, financially.

The non-disclosure response does imply that the charges are more significant and confidential than the payment of £93.5m to a private commercial company!

It is backing the Sinfin Incincerator Project “horse” even though all of the evidence suggests that it will never make it to the “starting line”; the original contractor could not get the technology to work and it is unlikely that it would ever be a financially sustainable public service.

County needs to convince itself, and its auditors that capitalising the termination contract payment is correct and that the charges made by itself to Derby City Council are “legitimate”. If it can’t, then it raises questions over its financial future and the way the Council has been managed.

Despite the response from the County Council’s solicitor this is in the public interest and there should be full dislcosure to Council Tax payers.