A series of errors has led Medway Council to restart negotiating its £200 million waste contracts just a week before new firms were supposed to take over.
The council admitted this week mistakes were made during 18 months hard negotiations to improve Medway’s recycling and ensure Medway meets its government targets to reduce the amount of waste going to landfill sites.
The blunders breeched EU regulations and put the council at serious financial risk.
The council is now conducting an internal investigation into how the errors were made and is asking bidders to resubmit their final bids again.
Medway Council’s chief executive Neil Davies said “This action is being taken to ensure the council is being fair and transparent.”
In the meantime, the council has extended its agreement with current contractors, French-owned firm Veolia. The contract was due to expire at the end of September but will continue for at least another 12 months.
The council aims to award the new contracts in January or February 2010 and hope the contracts will come into force by this time next year.
The council agreed in February 2007 to look for new contractors for Medway’s waste collection and disposal.
Andy McGrath, assistant director of frontline services, said: “Medway has the benefit of a weekly household waste collection and this will not change.
“The aim of the new contract is for kitchen waste to be collected with garden waste and also to increase the number of items collected in the kerbside recycling.”