What it costs the council to deal with each tonne of rubbish and recycling — collecting it, disposing of it, recycling it. Because every council handles waste and a tonne is a tonne anywhere, this is about the fairest head-to-head cost comparison you can make between councils. Higher means the council pays more to handle the same amount of waste; unusually high with no obvious reason is a genuine value-for-money question.
| Council | Class | Value | In its class |
|---|---|---|---|
| City of London | london | 1,105 | 1st worst of 33 |
| Isles of Scilly | unitary | 559 | 1st worst of 61 |
| Westmorland and Furness | unitary | 308.43 | 2nd worst of 61 |
| Hammersmith & Fulham | london | 279.22 | 2nd worst of 33 |
| Kensington & Chelsea | london | 263.49 | 3rd worst of 33 |
| Cornwall UA | unitary | 253.76 | 3rd worst of 61 |
| West Berkshire UA | unitary | 251.09 | 4th worst of 61 |
| Wakefield | metropolitan | 245.99 | 1st worst of 36 |
| Tower Hamlets | london | 244.08 | 4th worst of 33 |
| Reading UA | unitary | 239.71 | 5th worst of 61 |
| Council | Class | Value | In its class |
|---|---|---|---|
| Uttlesford | district | 8.53 | 1st best of 161 |
| Gloucestershire CC | county | 10.77 | 1st best of 21 |
| Brentwood | district | 15.24 | 2nd best of 161 |
| Worthing | district | 31.36 | 3rd best of 161 |
| Hart DC | district | 33.93 | 4th best of 161 |
| Suffolk CC | county | 35.07 | 2nd best of 21 |
| Havering | london | 36.65 | 1st best of 33 |
| Adur | district | 39.35 | 5th best of 161 |
| South Norfolk | district | 40.12 | 6th best of 161 |
| Mid Suffolk | district | 40.4 | 7th best of 161 |
| name | waste-cost-per-tonne |
|---|---|
| dataset | 01-revenue-outturn |
| kind | constructed |
| type | numeric |
| unit | £ per tonne |
| grain | council-year |
| role | feature |
| source | Formula: `(RO5_envcll_net_cur_exp + RO5_envdsp_net_cur_exp + RO5_envrcy_net_cur_exp) * 1000 / tonnes collected`. Inputs: this dataset's CSV + tonnage from sibling dataset `12-wastedataflow` |
| period | FY 2017-18 to 2024-25, annual (year_ending 201803-202503) |
| missingness | "Rows with status other than "submitted" (i.e. "total" aggregates and "not submitted") must be filtered out; a non-submitted council-year is a genuine gap, not zero. 2024-25 covers 410/411 councils. Councils abolished/created in 2017-25 reorganisations appear only for the years they existed. Undefined where the 12-wastedataflow tonnage join is missing for a council-year." |
| score_note | Cleanest like-for-like unit cost in the dataset — universal service, real output denominator; needs the dataset 12 tonnage join. |
| calculated | calculated/waste-cost-per-tonne.csv |
| calculated_rows | 2648 |
| calculated_periods | 2017-18 to 2024-25 |
| calculated_date | 2026-08-13 |
| peer_group | districts (n=188), unitaries (n=64), metropolitan boroughs (n=36), London boroughs (n=33), counties (n=26) — scored within each class against its median/IQR |
True unit cost of the waste service: combined collection, disposal and recycling net spend per tonne collected. Because waste is a universal, comparable service, this is the cleanest cross-council efficiency measure in the dataset. In two-tier areas collection and disposal sit with different councils, so compute within the appropriate class.