I must express my despair about the whole recycling issue.
We moved into our house in November and have taken over a garden which had been neglected. We knew we were going to struggle with having to dispose of the garden waste in a green bin, but then found out that the bin was only collected once a month during the five winter months.
I assume the person in chrage of the recycling is not a gardener, otherwise they’d know that the winter time is when most pruning and cutting back takes place.
Grass clippings are easily composted at home, it is the branches and bigger garden waste which needs to disposed of, as most home owners do not have a garden big enough to wait for that material to compost. So the decision to reduce the collection service is a rather stupid one.
If the green bin collection is also going to be charged, the whole green bin collection service might as well be scrapped. People are going to dispose of garden waste somewhere else (probably illegally), where it can compost as nature intended.
I visit the Netherlands regularly, as well as Belgium and Germany. Those countries have a fantastic record on recycling and very little, if anything, goes into landfill.
To encourage people to recycle green waste, not just garden waste but also vegetable peelings, tea bags, egg shells etc, the councils give out once a year free bags of compost made of the material people have put into the green bins as a ‘thank you’.
I have ‘inherited’ my mother’s green bin, which is handed out to each household for collecting all the compostable, non-meat items indoors, which they then can empty outside in the large green bin.
This bin is completely odour free and is not an unpleasant item inside a house.
To justify the charging for green bin collections by saying it is ‘an optional service’ is ridiculous. We do not use public transport, schooling or some other services but still have to pay for them and are not given the option of ‘opting out’.
I do hope that the EU is going to clamp down on Britain for the excessive amounts that go into landfill. Perhaps it will concentrate councils’ minds into taking recycling seriously, although any fines ultimately get paid for by the tax payer, so no penalty for the councillors.
Lucienne Bennett
Woolsthorpe by Colsterworth