Finally someone is calloing out the return scam.
https://www.breakingnews.ie/ireland/government-urged-to-reform-or-disband-shambolic-re-turn-scheme-after-e500000-bin-raiding-bill-1905390.html
Never thought I'd agree with Peadar.
Tóibín had also questioned the amount of money accumulated by Re-turn, the private company that operates the DRS, claiming that €103 million in unredeemed deposits was “resting in its account”.
and
Tóibín said the DRS deposit was “like a tax” on consumers, except it doesn’t go towards paying for hospitals, education, housing and other public services.“Instead, it goes to a company and to CEO salaries that they refuse to publish,” he said.
Tóibín said the DRS deposit was “like a tax” on consumers, except it doesn’t go towards paying for hospitals, education, housing and other public services.
“Instead, it goes to a company and to CEO salaries that they refuse to publish,” he said.
Reminds me of the M50 toll bridge. In incredibly stupid idea. Maybe I'm just getting old.
I dont see it as whataboutery at all.
Look at incidents like this:
https://news.sky.com/story/thousands-of-tons-of-uk-plastic-dumped-across-world-11218595
It demonstrates that organisations can and do greenwash and make false, inaccurate or incomplete claims about such initiatives.
Whether through incompetence or marketing disingenuousness they are well capable of pulling the wool over the eyes of the general public about the reality of the benefits of schemes etc.
The Return website is a case in point with false claims made for the scheme and recycling.
I think it likely that not all items collected are recycled. Some could be incinerated or landfilled or dumped in the sea. It depends on the economics and scrupulousness of whoever Return sent the items onto. Bundles could be sold on to outside the EU and after that anything could happen.
So while I would not go so far as to say probably most of it ends up outside of recycling nor would I consider it a conspiracy theory to propose it.
You brought up auditing the books and reporting to the minister [snip]
Poster warned - Do not throw personal attacks at other posters.
-Mod
I'd prefer to see PET bottles recycled than incinerated, but I'd prefer them to be incinerated than having them littering the streets, countryside and beaches.
The claim was -
90% of PET plastic gets shipped out of Ireland.
Probably to be incinerated, buried or strangle a porpoise.
That was the other poster, not you.
Of course a lot of malpractice exists in the waste industry but we are talking about one small part of it DRS in Ireland.
Without evidence we can't prove one way or another exactly who is right.
My proposition is that on the balance of probabilities the plastic/aluminium from Re-turn is recycled.
Like Ive said to you countless times. Something can either be true, false or disputed.
How is me stating "probably" any different to:
on the balance of probabilities
?
Either you're thick or you dont debate in good faith. Its tiresome.
The difference is that Re-turn is a company operating under legislation in Ireland.
It has a board of directors, solicitors, accountant s etc.
You are an anonymous poster on the internet suggesting without any evidence that they are lying and breaking laws.
Do you get it now ?
You have already called me a clown, now suggesting I'm either thick or not posting in good faith.
Enough is enough.
Once again. Not the question that was asked.
Yeah I agree. I think thats enough of me entertaining your bad faith debating.
Return having a board of directors didnt stop them putting false information on their website about the EU targets.
The citing of accountants is completely mystìfying. What basis this would show up in audited accounts is not explained.
As to the claim a law would be broken if items collected by Return and sent abroad were actually incinerated - without more information that has no credibility and is bizarre on the face of it.
Whereas numerous actual incidents of plastics collected for recycling ending up elsewhere can be cited.
Guaranteed stream, not system. Do people just read what they want to read these days?
What's your point here? That sometimes it's not recycled and might be incinerated? And, what, we should go back to the old system where sometimes it's not recycled and might end up in the bushes? Surely you can see which of these two options is better, no?
Being shipped abroad and recycled/incinerated is still leagues ahead of "in the green bin, maybe, or the black one….or the hedge, or the canal, or the…….."
Proof that Re-Turn fans have flip flopped from recycling to collection because they cant back up the recycling claim? What a bizarre request for proof. The posts are in the main Re-Turn thread.
So no, you don't have any proof then? Good to know.
Edit: just saw your abusive posts towards elperello…….good luck, and welcome to the ignore list
You are in no position to criticise me after the way you have let yourself down today.
Correction. I read stream as system. So a guaranteed stream that goes out of the country with no verification on what happens to it is better than it staying here?
Your stance seems to be: "Exporting plastic somewhere else is better than keeping it here. Not our problem". That should be top of Re-Turn's website homepage. Catchy stuff. Well worth having a DRS!
The posts are there. You obviously haven't read the main thread. Good to know.
The relevance of accounts is that there will be traceable evidence of the various companies dealt with and payments made and received.
It wasn't just incineration landfilling and dumping at sea. Both dumping at sea and landfilling separately collected recyclables are illegal in the EU.
Yes, numerous incidents of bad practice but not specifically carried out by Re-turn.
Thats just confirming its irrelevance. It can in no way show what happened the items once it reached those other companies nor would that come into the consideration of those preparing the accounts.
The landfilling and dumping could happen outside the EU if sold on by the other company. Regardless of where it could occur, you have not shown how that would amount to Return breaking any laws which was your original claim.
You say the old system where sometimes it's not recycled and ends up in the bushes.
Under THIS system there are countless bins full of recyclables being upended by people scavenging for Return items. I see it myself on collection days near were I work. Cardboard, paper and plastic strewn everywhere, and if it's windy and wet there are big soggy piles of cardboard and paper littering streets, walls, bushes that are difficult to clear up.
I think littering is far worse under Return than before. I can also assure you, as someone who lives near a coffee shop and newsagent my garden always has litter that people throw in the bushes as they walk from the shops, including Return items.
Money ie. payments in or out is always traceable in the event of a forensic audit if malpractice was investigated.
Your proposition is relying on the company not ensuring where the recyclables end up.
They have undertaken to collect and send for recycling. That's their job.
Just selling them to any waste broker would break the chain of responsibility.
Re-turn would certainly be entered as co-defendants if found to be supplying recyclables for illegal disposal.
On what basis would they be co-defendants? They are hardly going to send it to Landfillers R Us. More like Fly By Night waste disposal and recycling, dont ask why our prices are so good.
So how have they undertaken to ensuring where their recyclables end up? Please share this information because there are no such details on their website beyond 'collected for recycling' and it is your claim.
Where is this commitment to a chain of responsibility or a legal onus on Return to establish it?
It would be good for one to exist but does it?
Once they send the items to a company with the appropriate licence, permits etc for recycling Return can wash their hands of it.
What that company actually does with the specific items directly or indirectly... which could include selling on outside the EU, you have not provided any information on how Return have a say in that or a responsibility to do so.
Ffs. Only seeing this now.
Amazing how some posters get super sensitive or better yet offended on behalf of someone else at the exact moment they start losing the debate.
It doesn't matter where it goes the money trail will follow it.
If a crime is committed it always comes out.
What do you think they got the gig from the Government to do ?
Answer: collect the containers and send them for recycling.
They can't just abrogate responsibility by selling on to a dodgy dealer.
The stuff doesn't disappear into thin air, all along the chain it can be tracked.
The company can't walk away from the objectives for which it was established.
You're trying very hard to show how this scheme could be run badly but missing a very important part.
What would be the motive to do that ?
The money trail does not show what happened a bottle and it is getting desperate to suggest it does when backed up by abslolutely nothing. It is a money trail only. Look at the traceability for food. Why was that needed if accounts and money trails could be used to follow it?
They are the board and employees of a company. They didnt set the scheme up. What is the direct link between the government in establishing the scheme and the objectives of those remunerated to implement it? It is an indirect link only and the interests can diverge.
We have seen banks and businesses and 'charities' run into the ground by its board and employees to the detriment of shareholders or the mission of said charity.
The worse RTE conducts its financial affairs the more it gets bailed out by government.
The government just cared about ticking a box to meet an EU collection target. They have handed over responsibility to something under even less control than a quango.
So why not? Why cant they abrogate responsibility that way? You have been asked and have failed to provide any legal or regulatory reason why they could not.
So of course they could plead ignorance and walk away. This is Ireland. We dont do accountability. No doubt a report might be commissioned, 'lessons learned', a token early retirement or resignation as a brief holiday before getting back onto the gravy train. No long term consequences.
You are outlining what should be the situation. But you have provided zero information of any legal onus on Return or any case precedence to support it, your claim is getting more unconvincing with each post.
If the bottles sent by Return to another company, then to outside the EU and is landfilled or dumped...
What actual crime is committed? It may not even be illegal under that country's laws.
You have completely failed to show that:
1. A crime is committed
2. It would have a legal / criminal / regulatory consequence for Return as a party to it.
You're off on flights of fancy.
Dreams of crooked companies running companies into the ground.
Notions of recyclables being exported all over the place to who knows where.
Now it's banks, charities and even RTE bailouts.
You've even thrown together a ficticious account of how an expose of wrongdoing could be handled by the company.
Not a scintilla of evidence that any of this malfeasance has taken place at Re-turn.
And you're demanding proof from me !
Meanwhile back in the real world DRS is firmly embedded in most people's routines, it's meeting the targets and washing it's face.
Substantially it does what it was set up to do.
Sure there are still issues to be addressed and consumers interests could be given a higher priority.
These are the things to work on in the next phase.
Knock it off with the personal sniping and throwing insults at fellow posters. Posts have been deleted and warnings issued already.
Bans will be handed out if people can’t stay civil.
You seem to have forgotten you were the one who claimed Return would have committed a crime if a shipment of their collected items were dumped or land filled. After multiple posts you have gotten no closer to establishing this.
You also brought boards of directors, accountants and auditors into the discussion as some sort of proof of Returns bona fides - not me. It is therefore entirely valid to cite examples of malfeasance and failures of such governance in public, private, not for profit organisations etc
As for "dreams of crooked companies" - I dont know how anyone can post that after Anglo Irish Bank, Peter McVerry Trust, Goal etc. In the North the Cash for Ash scandal.
This is the sort of thing that has happened and happens in the real world not the naive / optimistic fable you have outlined of boards and organisations always conducting themselves as they should.
Meanwhile back in the real world this is the sort of thing that can happen and it is entirely reasonable to raise it as a concern in relation to Return.
I thought we had established that landfilling or dumping at sea of separately collected recyclables is illegal in the EU.
Furthermore it's logical to conclude that claiming to be fulfilling the objectives of an EU directive while colluding in similar activity outside the EU would likely constitute fraud.
You're scenario requires extensive corporate governance breaches at every level in Re-turn, false reporting to the Government and in turn the Government using false figures in reporting the EU.
Have a look at the Duties of a Director and Corporate Government Law in general.
That'll give you a better picture of the significance of both Board and Executive and their responsibilities.
You are doubling down on showing lists of where governance failed or is suspected of failing.
None of these are connected to Re-turn.
This is the reality.
Mmmm horsemeat.....
Yeah, you brought up the EU multiple posts back. You are now ignoring the multiple subsequent posts where you failed to explain after asking how it would be (a) a criminal act by Return if done indirectly by a third party they simply sold the recyclables on to and (b) how it would be a crime if done outside the EU. As you've had about half a dozen posts now to try to back it up, it is logical to conclude you cannot back up your claim.
How it is 'logical' to conclude that it would be fraud? Argument by assertion once again based on absolutely no foundation, evidence, case law, nothing.
You now introduce a new red herring, seemingly this scenario involves 'false figures' being reported to the EU. Plucked out of nowhere. Based on absolutely nothing just a notion in your head as to what is logical or should be the case. The figures to be reported to the EU relate to collection only. Unless you can provide any such basis for those reports to the EU, you appear to be engaging in the same muddying of the waters as on the Return site where they state they are setup to meet EU recycling targets.
There are no such EU targets. Just Return pulling the wool over the eyes of the public as to what happens with the items collected.
Muddying waters, ted herrings porpoises, at least we are sticking to marine pollution.
Of course dumping at sea was one of the crimes the other poster thought Re-turn was probably implicated in.
Now you are looking for citations again when all you are bringing to the discussion is an ever growing list of things Re-turn could be guilty of.
No citation from you at all because there is nothing there.
The same could be claimed without evidence about any company in Ireland.
All you have is suspicion built on a strong dislike of DRS and the company operating it.
Well Irish Rail are using the bin raiding as an excuse for not installing the machines
https://www.breakingnews.ie/ireland/irish-rail-opts-against-re-turn-machines-due-to-people-raiding-bins-for-empty-bottles-and-cans-1909669.html
That Dublin Council clean up bill gets higher every time it's mentioned. 857,000 euro and rising.
Has no-one told Irish Rail how well bin surrounds worked in Dublin? 👀
It's understandable that Irish Rail don't want to install RVMs if they don't have to.
Their business is running trains and that's what they want to concentrate on. Buying and operating RVMs would mean assigning staff to empty and service them.
However, their reasoning that the machines would cause more scavenging is hard to understand.
Surely if people passing through stations put their cans/bottles in an RVM rather than a bin there would be less for the scavengers ?
Anyway if they aren't going for the RVMs the next best solution is secure bins.
Their business is running trains yes, but they make money from sales of products in the DRS Scheme, they receive a government subsidy to operate their service. They have an obligation to provide a DRS service.
Consumers are forced to clean, store, and return items so Irish Rail can do their part.
