Cwm Environmental Ltd

The request was partially successful.

Dear Mr Tillman,

Please provide the following information regarding Cwm Environmental Ltd, the subsidiary company, wholly owned (51%) by Carmarthenshire County Council;

1. Full list of the management board/senior officers of Cwm Environmental Ltd, including any major shareholders and 'sleeping' partners. Please also provide the salaries, allowances and expenses for these too.

2. Please provide a list, again for those in 1) above, of any business interests, membership of organisations, shareholdings, and any other information available either related or unrelated to Cwm Environmental Ltd.

3. Provide a full list of all organisations who have been in receipt of any grant from Cwm Environmental Ltd including details of the grant and the amount. Please also provide a list of any projects/organisations who have applied and been refused such a grant.

4. Provide details of any breaches of environmental regulations by Cwm Environmental Ltd and/or it's employees.

Please provide this information retrospectively for the past five years, up to today's date, which will include any other names that this business has been known by.If you are not the information holder for this request please pass it on to whoever is responsible.

Yours faithfully,

Jacqui Thompson

FOIA, Carmarthenshire County Council

Dear Mrs. Thompson

Thank you for your request for information, which was received on 19th
December, 2011 and is being dealt with under the Freedom of Information
Act 2000. We are therefore required to provide you with a response
within 20 working days, which will be on or before 18th January, 2011.

If we require any clarification or further details, we will contact you
as soon as possible - if this is the case, then the timescale for
response specified above may be subject to change.

In the meantime, if you have any queries, please do not hesitate to
contact me, remembering to quote the reference number provided above in
any communications.

Yours sincerely

John Tillman

Swyddog Gwybodaeth a Diogelu Data

Adran y Prif Weithredwr

Cyngor Sir Gaerfyrddin

Information & Data Protection Officer

Chief Executive's Department

Carmarthenshire County Council

Mewnol/Internal: 4127

Allanol/External: 01267 224127

show quoted sections

FOIA, Carmarthenshire County Council

Dear Mrs Thompson,

I refer to your request for information, which was received on 19th
December, 2011 and has been dealt with under the Freedom of Information
Act 2000.

The specific information you requested was as follows:

"Please provide the following information regarding Cwm Environmental
Ltd, the subsidiary company, wholly owned (51%) by

Carmarthenshire County Council;

1. Full list of the management board/senior officers of Cwm
Environmental Ltd, including any major shareholders and
'sleeping'partners. Please also provide the salaries, allowances and
expenses for these too.

2. Please provide a list, again for those in 1) above, of any business
interests, membership of organisations, shareholdings, and any other
information available either related or unrelated to Cwm Environmental
Ltd.

3. Provide a full list of all organisations who have been in receipt of
any grant from Cwm Environmental Ltd including details of the grant and
the amount. Please also provide a list of any projects/organisations who
have applied and been refused such a grant.

4. Provide details of any breaches of environmental regulations by Cwm
Environmental Ltd and/or it's employees.

Please provide this information retrospectively for the past five years,
up to today's date, which will include any other names that this
business has been known by.If you are not the information holder for
this request please pass it on to whoever is responsible."

In partial response to your first question, information on the Board of
CWM is already published online by the company as follows:

http://www.cwmenvironmental.co.uk/corpor...
x

The Council does not hold any information relevant to the remainder of
your request.

Since companies such as CWM are classed as public authorities in their
own right under the Freedom of Information Act, should you wish to
re-direct your request, the contact details may be found on the above
website.

Alternatively, should you wish to have your request transferred to CWM,
please let me know.

Yours sincerely

John Tillman
Swyddog Gwybodaeth a Diogelu Data
Adran y Prif Weithredwr
Cyngor Sir Gaerfyrddin

Information & Data Protection Officer
Chief Executive's Department
Carmarthenshire County Council

Mewnol/Internal: 4127
Allanol/External: 01267 224127

Mae'r e-bost hwn ac unrhyw atodiadau yn gyfrinachol ac wedi'u bwriadu at ddefnydd yr unigolyn y'u cyfeiriwyd ato/ati yn unig. Os derbyniwch y neges hon trwy gamgymeriad, rhowch wybod i'r sawl a'i hanfonodd ar unwaith, dilëwch y neges o'ch cyfrifiadur a dinistriwch unrhyw gopïau papur ohoni. Ni ddylech ddangos yr e-bost i neb arall, na gweithredu ar sail y cynnwys. Eiddo'r awdur yw unrhyw farn neu safbwyntiau a fynegir, ac nid ydynt o reidrwydd yn cynrychioli safbwynt y Cyngor. Dylech wirio am firysau eich hunan cyn agor unrhyw atodiad. Nid ydym yn derbyn unrhyw atebolrwydd am golled neu niwed a all fod wedi'i achosi gan firysau meddalwedd neu drwy ryng-gipio'r neges hon neu ymyrryd â hi.

This e-mail and any attachments are confidential and intended solely for the use of the individual to whom it is addressed.
If received in error please notify the sender immediately, delete the message from your computer and destroy any hard copies. The e-mail should not be disclosed to any other person, nor the contents acted upon.

Any views or opinions expressed are those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of the Council.

You should carry out your own virus check before opening any attachment. We accept no liability for any loss or damage which may be caused by software viruses or interception/interruption of this mail.

Dear Mr Tillman,

Thank you for you partial response.

Firstly I would like to point out that the link you have provided to CWM is broken, however I am able to access the page.

I find it hard to believe that you do not hold the remainder of the information - this company is not only owned by Carmarthenshire Council (51%) but is an integral part of the Council's 'Waste management strategy'. It also features in the council accounts and is in debt to the Council for loans over £600,000.

Having said that, I would be grateful if you could pass on my request to CWM and I will take the matter from there. As CWM is obliged to release information under the FoI Act as a public body, I would appreciate if they could use the What Do They Know site under this thread.
If there is a probelm with that, or CWM would like to contact me directly, please pass on to them my email address, which I will provide on request if you do not already have it.

Yours sincerely,
Jacqui Thompson

FOIA, Carmarthenshire County Council

Dear Mrs Thompson,

Thank you for your email.

Your request has been passed on to CWM Environmental Ltd, who will respond in due course.

Yours sincerely

John Tillman
Swyddog Gwybodaeth a Diogelu Data
Adran y Prif Weithredwr
Cyngor Sir Gaerfyrddin

Information & Data Protection Officer
Chief Executive's Department
Carmarthenshire County Council

Mewnol/Internal: 4127
Allanol/External: 01267 224127

show quoted sections

Dear Mrs Thompson,

 

To the specific questions raised, we would respond by providing the
following information.

 

1. The current Board of the Company is:

 

 

Stuart Hancock, Chairman. Non Executive member

 Dudley Thomas, Company Secretary. Non Executive member

John Rees, Managing Director.Executive member.

Kath Ogden, Finance Director. Executive member.

Wynn Morgan, Operations Director. Executive member. (From October 2011)

 

In July 2011 (at the AGM) David Davies resigned from his position as the
operations director. Wynn Morgan was appointed after the shareholders
consent was obtained in October 2011   

 

Each individual directorship is reviewed on a biannual basis by its single
shareholder, which is Carmarthenshire County Council. .

 

There are no other shareholders or 'sleeping partners'.

 

The following interests are recorded against the named directors;

 

Stuart Hancock, John Rees: Carmarthenshire Recycling Co Ltd (CRCo) and
Pembrokeshire Recycling Co Ltd (PRCo).

Kath Ogden :CRCo, PRCo, and Full Moon Freight Ltd.

 

Both recycling companies are 'dormant' and do not currently trade and Full
Moon freight Ltd is an unrelated activity.

 

 

In the last set of audited accounts (2010) the aggregate emoluments of the
directors, including pension contributions was £281,000.

 

2. Organisations in receipt of Grant support from Cwm Environmental Ltd.

 

 During the 2010 year (last audited accounts) a total of £1433 was donated
by the Company to local organisations.

 

The maximum given to any one organisation was £250.

 

3) Environmental breaches.

 

There are no current recorded breaches of environmental regulations
against the company, nor its staff.

 

 

 

Whilst we accept FOIA applies to the company, the requirements of auditing
regulations are different to public organisations. When data protection
regulations are also applied, the degree of information provided in
response, can be different.

 

John Rees (managing director).

 

Please note I will be away from work until Monday the 23^rd January

 

Dear Mr Tillman,

Please could you pass this request for clarification on to Mr John Rees, Cwm Environmental Ltd.

Thank you for your response. Please could you clarify your response at 2;

"Organisations in receipt of Grant support from Cwm Environmental Ltd;
During the 2010 year (last audited accounts) a total of £1433 was
donated by the Company to local organisations.
The maximum given to any one organisation was £250"

You may have misunderstood my request - you clearly have an extensive list of grant recipients on your website amounting, in money terms, to over £250,000 for the year 2010. When I asked about 'grant' support, I assumed it would cover all grants. Could you please explain the funding source of the £1433. I also asked about any organisations which had been refused ANY grants, which you have not answered.

In addition, as Cwm is owned by the Council could you please clarify the 'different' application of the Data Protection legislation referred to in your response.

I note you are away until the 23rd January but would appreciate a response as soon as possible.

Yours sincerely,

Jacqui Thompson

Dear Mrs. Thompson,

If I may I will start with the additional request for information in
relation to how FOIA applies to CWM Environmental Ltd.

The legislation relates to information which is held by the company .However
the information held by the company to comply with Company law will be
different to a Local Authority (LA) which has to comply with a myriad of
other legislation.

That being the general position we will try and comply with FOIA at all
times. What we cannot do is to provide information/responses to questions
which are inquisitive or commercial in nature, nor breach data protection
regulations. For example we do not have to hold a register of interest in
the same way as a LA. Each board member is expected to declare his or her
interests at anytime there is a likelihood of a 'conflict of interest', no
more.

On the last occasion you submitted a question, it was specifically targeted
at CWM's own financial resources and the extent of the response was tailored
accordingly. The £1433 came from our own resources and appear in our annual
accounts for 2010.Typically these are direct requests to CWM as a local
company to support worthy causes.

What you have now raised is an entirely different aspect which arises
indirectly as a result of what CWM does because of its landfill activities.

These are not CWM funds but merely a Government concession to the
introduction of the landfill tax scheme. The scheme allows just over 6% of
this tax collected by the Company to be re distributed to qualifying groups
within a defined geographic area. The whole process is strictly governed by
ENTRUST on behalf of HMRC.CWM is allowed to achieve some positive publicity
out of the scheme (hence the name) but no financial or other direct
benefits.

The administration of this fund is independent of the company and to comply
we set up a process with Grantscape a number of years ago. Information
relating to successful schemes can be accessed on the following link
http://www.grantscape.org.uk/grantshome/... I have
raised the issue of all schemes with Grantscape this morning and they are
firmly of the view this is in breach of data protection regulations.

Yours sincerely..........John Rees

show quoted sections

Dear Mr Rees,

Many thanks for your responses. I have one further query related to the above request.

Carmarthenshire County Council owns 51% of the company, could you please explain who owns the other 49%?

I trust you will be able to respond without taking up too much of your time,

Yours sincerely,

caebrwyn

Dear Mrs Thompson,

Cwm Environmental Ltd is wholly owned (100%) by Carmarthenshire County
Council .There are no other Shareholders.

Yours sincerely...........John Rees

show quoted sections

Dear Mrs Thompson,

 

I refer to your FOIA request sent to CCC on the 26^th January 2012.They
have referred questions 1 to 4 to CWM Environmental Ltd for a direct
response.

 

Q1. We cannot identify the sum as quoted (£3,528,000) .The same set of
accounts refer to the Company acquiring the trade, assets and liabilities
of its subsidiary (Carmarthenshire recycling company Ltd) in book value
terms and not cash. Details are provided in Note 24 (page 17) giving fair
value for each class of asset and liability acquired.

 

Q2. The same set of accounts fully explain the reason and terms by which
the loan from CCC was obtained.(pages 2 and 14).

 

Q3.The acquisition involved the purchase of land and existing lease
buyouts (page 2).

 

Q4 Details of the acquisition are available from the Land Registry.

 

Yours Sincerely …………John Rees   (Managing  Director)