BID Board Director Dominic Burgess from Loop Recycling provides some useful guidance on this new legislation.

From 31 March 2025 (or 31 March 2027 for micro-firms), all workplaces (businesses and non-domestic premises) in England that employ more than 10 people have a legal duty to present the following wastes separated for collection by their waste collector:

• dry recyclable materials – plastic, metal, glass, paper and card

• food waste

• black bin waste – residual waste that cannot be recycled

In some cases paper and card may also need to be separated if your waste contractor has not completed an assessment for these to be collected with Dry Recyclable Materials, but for most businesses the legislation will mean three separate bins.

Workplaces that generate garden waste have a legal duty to manage it in accordance with the waste hierarchy and arrange for it to be recycled or composted if it delivers the best environmental outcome.

Workplaces can decide on the size of containers and frequency of collections based on the volume of waste they produce.

Workplaces that must follow these rules:

Any business or workplace premises that generates waste that is similar in nature and composition to household waste must follow these rules across their operations (including for example, staff kitchens). This includes all relevant non-domestic premises, such as:

• offices
• retail and wholesale
• transport and storage
• hospitality, such as cafes, restaurants, and hotels
• places of education, such as schools, colleges, and universities
• healthcare places, such as GP surgeries and hospitals
• care homes
• charities and those registered as charities
• places of worship
• penal institutes
• charity shops selling donated goods that came from a domestic property

Dry recyclable waste is:
• glass – such as drinks bottles and rinsed empty food jars
• metal – such as drinks cans and rinsed empty food tins, empty aerosols, aluminium foil, aluminium food trays and tubes
• plastic – such as rinsed empty food containers and bottles
• paper and cardboard – such as old newspapers, envelopes, delivery boxes and packaging.

Food waste is:
• food leftovers
• waste generated by preparing food (of any volume, including if the workplace does not serve food or have a canteen)

Black bin waste or residual waste is:
• absorbent hygiene products such as nappies
• highly contaminated materials like food packaging that cannot be washed

Micro-firms (workplaces with less than 10 full-time employees in total) are exempt until 31 March 2027

This relates to the total number of full time or full-time equivalent employees in a business, rather than in a certain business location. For example, if a business has 3 locations with 5 employees in each location, they have a total of 15 employees. For counting part-time employees, add a fraction based on their pro-rated hours. Volunteers are not included in determining the Full Time Equivalent (FTE) employee count for a business or non-domestic premise. This includes organisations that have volunteers across multiple premises.

Legal requirements for workplaces

Businesses and non-domestic premises have a legal duty to take all reasonable steps to apply the waste hierarchy and the duty of care in line with Simpler Recycling. If your landlord employs a waste company for you, or you have a waste management contractor, this company has a legal obligation to make sure any separately collected dry recyclables are sent for recycling and that any residual waste is correctly managed.

If you do not comply with these requirements by 31 March 2025 (or 31 March 2027 for micro firms), you are at risk of receiving a compliance notice from the Environment Agency. Compliance notices can also be issued against anyone who is not separating waste in agreement with their waste collector. This will often be the waste producers, for example the business, but this may also be the landlords or facilities management companies that are presenting waste on behalf of the waste producer.

It is an offence to fail to comply with a compliance notice and enforcement action may be taken against you in line with the Environment Agency Enforcement and Sanctions Policy.

Further useful information and guidance can be found on the WRAP website which has published some useful guides by sector, and from fellow BID member Veolia in their Simpler Recycling Guide.

Illustration recycling bins courtesy of Open Clipart Vectors from Pixaby