Stan Dagg

Died: September 25, 2015

Stanley J Dagg, known as Stan, who has died aged 74, was the outstanding member of a small group of waste management officers who transformed and improved Scotland's public cleansing services over two decades.

Like many of his contemporaries, he trained and qualified as an environmental health officer (in Perthshire), taking additional courses to obtain the testamur of the (then) Institute of Public Cleansing, the professional body that regulated entry into the waste management profession.

After working as an EHO with Darlaston UDC and City of Dundee, he was a public cleansing and environmental health officer with the Government of Bermuda for a decade, returning to work in Scotland in 1975 as depute general manager of cleansing with City of Dundee DC, where he was involved in the development of the city's waste incineration facility as well as the routine provision of cleansing services.

In 1981, he was appointed director of cleansing for Renfrew DC, then the fourth largest Scottish local authority, and set about improving productivity and reorganising the council's refuse collection and waste treatment services, mothballing and then disposing of an ineffective waste composting plant, and maximising throughput at the Linwood incinerator.

In 1986, he was appointed director of cleansing for City of Glasgow DC and immediately embarked on a programme of rationalisation that saw productivity significantly improved, archaic working practices abandoned and council services retained in-house. At the same time, he devised a waste disposal strategy that served the council well for more than a decade.

He was actively involved in the professional body (by then the Institute of Wastes Management), serving on the Scottish Centre Council for nearly two decades and its chair from 1988-90. He was also a general councillor of the Institute and was elected to fellowship in 1993. He was a waste adviser to COSLA for many years, led the Institute's discussions with the Scottish Office on waste issues, and played a pivotal role in the Scottish Liaison Group for the Waste Management Industry Training Board. He also was involved in setting up a new HNC course in waste management at Stow College in the late 1980s, and the Centre for Waste Management at Glasgow Caledonian University in the mid 1990s. In 1991 he was awarded the Institute's President's Medal and prize for his significant contribution to the profession.

He retired from Glasgow City Council in 1998 and was appointed part-time professor/chair of the Caledonian Environment Centre, a post he held until 2004. In 1999 he was appointed chair of SEPA West Region and also a main SEPA board member, holding these posts until 2004. He was awarded an OBE in 2001 for services to the waste management industry.

A gregarious, affable gentleman, he will be remembered as being slow to anger, overlooking the shortcomings of colleagues and staff but with the ability to argue his case without giving offence. Few people had anything but good to say about him and many younger cleansing officers were motivated by his ability to always make time to listen, encourage and advise them irrespective of their status.

He married Irene Urquhart in 1965 and they celebrated their golden wedding earlier this year. He is survived by Irene, their son Kenneth (a consultant respiratory physician), daughters Michelle and Nicola (both lawyers) and six grandchildren.

J F CRAWFORD