CL:AIRE has completed its latest round of auditing for projects using the Definition of Waste Code of Practice (DoW CoP) and the results indicate the need for improvement on a range of issues. Following the Board meeting of the 28th March CL:AIRE has decided to take immediate steps to mitigate the problem areas and ensure:

1. an increased level of scrutiny is placed on projects and
2. continued regulator confidence in the system.

The common failings uncovered by the audits were -

• Materials Management Plans missing key info and not creating a clear plan;
• Missing or brief tracking systems;
• Missing schematics;
• Poor document and file referencing e.g. not creating a clear audit trail; and
• No or limited contingency plans or contracts.

Projects were reviewed by the CL:AIRE executive and given an initial grading, x3 projects reflecting the three categories above were then passed to an external, independent expert for a second opinion / Quality Assurance process.

Documents were assessed as either:

• Good - all documents present and generally in accordance with the guidance.
• Improvement Needed - most documents present but don’t accord with the industry guidance / small number of docs or key information missing.
• Poor - a significant number of documents missing or of a quality well below the industry standards or guidance within the DoW CoP.

Of the x10 projects only two were initially rated as Good, six were rated as Improvement Needed and two were rated Poor.

Immediate Actions

In order to begin mitigating these problems CL:AIRE will take the following actions:
Declaration admin fees will be increased from £40 to £85 per Declaration in order to cover the costs of the following -

• CL:AIRE will begin on-going, regular auditing of DoW CoP projects - the process and outcomes of which will be used to feedback to the wider scheme development and be made available to regulators.
• Redesign and development of an improved administration system for the DoW CoP, inc. as and when resources allow, a new focused website, project database system, digitaldocument suite (e.g. online MMP, bespoke Declarations, Verification report capture).

We hope you appreciate the importance of taking this action at this time; maintaining high standards in the initiative is critical to its longer-term success.

The fee increase will take effect from the 1st July 2019.