Outsourced services specialists, Smart Solutions, which is based in Newport, has won and is now delivering a £2m contract to provide managed services to support waste operations at a Welsh local authority.

Smart Solutions is employing 90 local staff, to work at Rhondda Cynon Taf County Borough Council’s materials recycling facility, providing 24-hour support at the site in Hirwaun, South Wales.

The initial two-year contract win sees Smart Solutions deliver staff to sort household recycling waste from RCT, sorting more than 120 tonnes of mixed recycling a day, which is then baled and sold back in to the manufacturing supply chain.

Since the onset of the contract Smart Solutions has met the council’s overall target of recycling 70 per cent of the materials coming into the facility for sorting.

Nathan Bowles, chief executive officer at Smart Solutions, said: “The contract win reflects the growth and development of our portfolio of clients and services that we have achieved in the last six years. By the council outsourcing the staff who operate the MRF, we can ensure that employees have training and professional development opportunities, as well as contracts of employment and access to a pension scheme. And at the same time, we’re able to provide the council with a flexible, cost effective and skilled workforce.

“Since the onset of the contract we have improved productivity, working practices, quality and recovery rates at the MRF. We’re now working to develop a plan to ensure the continued improvement of staff retention and health and safety standards at the MRF.”

Nigel Wheeler, director of streetcare at Rhondda Cynon Taf Council, said: “The key priorities for the new arrangement are to secure local employment and to continue to improve the quality and productivity level at the facility."