Alliance slams Nesbitt on waste strategy

12.00.00am UTC (GMT +0000) Wed 6th Nov 2002

Alliance Leader David Ford has strongly criticised former Environment Minister Dermot Nesbitt after he passed judgment on NIO Minister Angela Smith's handling of the new waste management strategy launched this week.

Mr Ford said: "Mr Nesbitt is of course an expert on waste. He wasted the chance to work through this process when he was a Minister, and now he is wasting our time with unwarranted criticism that should be levelled at himself.

"Decisions were delayed and ran away from when Mr Nesbitt and his UUP colleague Sam Foster were in charge. To now come back during suspension and blame his successor is typical of Mr Nesbitt, but not unexpected.

"Instead of waking up to waste when they had the opportunity, the Executive found itself sleepwalking into an environmental disaster that we will all be paying for for years."