The Council and my dustbin

kr15snw

We have a brown and green bin. Green is for recycables (not glass) and brown for everything else.

To be honest the only thing that goes in my brown bin is food / garden waste. I.e. stuff that can be composted. I would love to have a compost heap but by postage stamp of a garden just doesnt allow it! The tip have a garden waste section, but to be honest its 99% food waste im putting in that bin. Why on earth cant they give us a compost bin? They empty it into one giant compost pile and then sell it on and can even make money from it! I mean they currently make compost from garden waste, so surely chucking food on top wouldnt do any harm as it all goes the same way!

But my other gripe is that as there are only 2 of us we have the thin bins, great! Doesnt take up as much room in my mini garden. BUT. They collect the brown weekly, the green every other week!! We have one binliner a week in the brown bin. The green bin we tend to fill in a week though, so after 2 weeks my boyfriend tends to be standing on it trying to fit it in.

If the are trying to encourage recylcing shouldnt they make it easier for me to recylcle? Weekly collections would be a start!!!

superscaper

Brooker_Dave wrote: »

It's all contracted out, so different councils contractors have differing ideas as to what is best.

Exactly and the precise recycling facilities are dependant on local area as well. Not all regions can recycle the same materials or material types. For example where I live the different councils in this area use one recycling plant that has an automatic plastic bottle sorter and so plastic bottles are to be put in the correct recycling bin but any other form of plastic has to be put in the ordinary rubbish for landfill. No point in putting them in the recycling if they literally don't have the actual facility to recycle them.

davidlizard

OP here again. Cheers all.

I have spoke with next door about the problem, and he has already been on to our local councillor. She has been inundated with complaints, but apparently nothing can be done as a contract has been let and they cannot change it. She is going to raise this again, but is not hopeful.

Needless to say, the queue at the local dump yesterday was huge - it went the 1/2 mile along the access road, then along the main road, causing queues in both directions.

For the record, we estimate that we recycle (ie put in recycle bin or compost) around 75% of our stuff. However we get a growing list of stuff from the council that they will not accept for recycling (coloured paper and just about every type of plastic except drinks bottles being the latest additions) so that rate is likely to decrease. We usually get nowhere near filling the bin each fortnight, but over a month it will fill - an that chicken we had a couple of weekends back will really stink, especially in the unlikely event of warm weather.

rosysparkle

We have our bins emptied on Mondays and the binmen come on the preceding Saturday when Monday is a bank holiday.

We have a black bin for general waste, emptied fortnightly, a green bin for garden waste and cardboard, also emptied fortnightly. A blue box for glass and tins and batteries (batteries have to go into a carrier) and a blue bag for paper. The blue box and bag is collected fortnightly as well. We get a Sally Army textile bag from time to time which is collected with the blue box and bag, but I usually put outgrown clothes into one of the charity bags we get regularly. The council doesn't collect plastics or food waste, but there is a plastics bank at the local supermarket and the council will sell us a cheap compost bin for food waste if we want one.

There's five of us and we don't generate enough waste to fill either of our bins in a fortnight, but I would complain if the bins didn't get emptied for a month; OP's council should have addressed the bank holiday collections when they were outsourcing the service.

C_Ronaldo

We have less than half a bin full of rubbish and its emptied every week, id like to know what people throw away to make theyre bin full

pianeet

troll3d wrote: »

I was not really thinking about the recycling so much then as the council and governments belief that the British will put up with any and all demands put to them, like the fuel duty we pay, and now the price increase we will pay for a service that we are doing more of ourselves waste disposal.

Our French neighbours would not put up with this behaviour from there elected officials.

the french have the right idea,my best mate lives in france and there recyclable rubbish is weighed when it is collected and they get a rebate on there rates,,i would even recycle the neighbours rubbish if i was going to get a rebate;)

novelli

C_Ronaldo wrote: »

We have less than half a bin full of rubbish and its emptied every week, id like to know what people throw away to make theyre bin full

ummm, rubbish!!!!!!!!!!

tomstickland

This might be of interest:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7323769.stm