A Nottinghamshire council has announced plans to downsize household waste bins to try to encourage more recyling.
The wheelie bins currently used for waste may instead become the bins for garden waste, according to Ashfield District Council.
Residents will then receive bins three quarters the size of their predecessors to hold household rubbish.
Edd de Coverly, the council’s director of environment, believes the bin change is a necessary one to meet local targets.
He said: “There is clearly a moral imperative to ensure that we recycle as much as we can. It is something our residents are very keen on, and ask us about often.”
The UK has a national target to recycle 50 per cent of waste by 2020 and the Ashfield authority could fall victim to large financial penalties if it does not improve the current rate, which is around the 34 per cent mark.
“We need to act in a very positive and environmentally stable way by introducing this new scheme,” Mr de Coverly added.
Ashfield U3A Gardening Group’s co-ordinator Chris Blaiklock is a man firmly behind the idea as well.
He told Notts TV: “Some people are on more limited incomes than myself and have smaller gardens. The consequence is they haven’t got the facility to keep three large compost bins as I do.”
“For them, I’m sure it’ll be a considerable asset to be able to recycle their waste through the local authority. It can only be a good thing. I would suggest that all councils should take a leaf out of Ashfield’s book within Nottinghamshire.”
But not everyone was so keen on the idea, here’s what some Ashfield locals thought:
Video: Ashfield Residents have their say on the imminent bin change
