5509 (2025). Hon Rachel Brooking to the Minister for the Environment

5509 (2025). Hon Rachel Brooking to the Minister for the Environment: What priority, if any, has she given to addressing the risks of battery fires in waste collection and processing facilities?

Hon Penny Simmonds: Local councils play a central role in the safe management and disposal of waste, including batteries at end of life, and are responsible for ensuring adequate systems are in place. Councils receive money from the waste levy to implement their waste management and minimisation plans (WMMPs), and battery management should be set out in those WMMPs, and managed through the funds that they receive. E-waste, including batteries, was declared a priority product in 2020, and work is being progressed to develop and implement a product stewardship scheme to help ensure batteries are managed appropriately at end of life. I am advised that the Ministry for the Environment are also meeting with relevant stakeholders to discuss the issues relating to batteries further.