The first steps towards changing Pembrokeshire’s rubbish collections were taken at a meeting of Pembrokeshire County Council’s Policy Overview and Scrutiny committee meeting last week, however a three- weekly collection is looking less likely.

The meeting heard that changes were necessary in order to make £1.2 million worth of savings and to meet future Welsh Government recycling targets.

Among the measures proposed to meet efficiencies and Welsh government targets are reducing black bag collections to once every three weeks capping the number of sacks per household and working collaboratively with other county councils.

However members were told that the plans were still in very early stages and that they were being asked to give their input into policy considerations.

“Never before have we bought considerations so early,” said Cllr Huw George, cabinet member for environmental and regulatory services.

“They are policy considerations that will guide us as we move on. This isn’t for next year or the year after, we are planning the service for the next ten years. This isn’t a decision to be made in haste.”

Richard Brown, head of environment and civil contingencies, added that if the savings were not made from the waste management budget, they would have to come from other departments.

Public concern about an increase in fly tipping and the impact on the changes on families with a large amount of young children and households where more residual waste was generated due to medical conditions were all voiced at the meeting.

Chairman, Rhys Sinnett, asked for firmer evidence of what would be done to prevent fly tipping. Richard Brown clarified that the way fly tipping was recorded had changed, leading to what seemed like an increase. He added that further modelling done by consultants Eunomia Research and Consulting Ltd would pick up on the financial impact of fly tipping.

Mr Brown added that some authorities have introduced absorbent hygiene collection service for households that generate extra waste. However there was a certain stigma to that and a cost that would offset savings from three weekly collections.

He added that if the council pursued the avenue of a limited number of sacks per household there could be an exclusion clause for certain households, however there would be an administrative cost to ensuring that that remained relevant.

“The steer I’m getting is that three weeks is not a favoured option from members of the committee,” said Cllr Sinnett. “I think the restricted bags option is something that should be looks at and explored further. The clear steer from members here is that three weekly is not a preferred option.”

Councillors favoured exploring working closely with Ceredigion County Council, rather than outsourcing waste services and keeping orange bag collections as weekly so as not to impact on recycling targets.

They also favoured introducing the changes across the whole county at the same time rather than phasing them in.

Joe Papineschi the director of Eunomia Research and Consulting Ltd thanked the committee for the input at this stage.

“The feedback very understandable and not entirely surprising,” he said. “I think your feedback is very useful and will then feed in.

“It has been been fantastic. I have got lots of insights and new ideas.”

Cllr Sinnett added: “We are happy to look at any evidence you put before us. Happy to receive that information as part of any future considerations.”

A report will now go before cabinet and waste management will come back before policy overview and scrutiny committee in March 2017.

The results of an imminent public consultation on potential budget measures will also be fed into that meeting.