LAWR

the economic argument is the strongest here – it makes no sense to incur the cost of burning or burying material which – almost all of the time – has a market value. Then there's a call to action – householders can help by recycling all they can and avoiding contamination. Number 2: "Councils delight in making recycling complicated for householders." A lot of people seem to be confused by what MRFs can and can't do – a situation not helped by the fact that each MRF is different. Some newspapers seem to think the technology exists to separate high quality recycling from general waste, and that source separation by householders is just to save councils the trouble. We need to explain why councils adopt the different approaches. How about: "Source separation generally leads to higher value recycling, but co-mingled recycling is simpler for residents and cheaper to collect; both therefore have their advantages, and which one is preferable depends on local circumstances." Number 3: "Fortnightly residual waste collections are just about councils making life difficult and smelly for residents." Since Eric Pickles (the former secretary of state at the Department for Communities and Local Government) spent much of the last five years peddling this message, it's pretty pervasive. A multi-pronged response is needed. I'd suggest the following: • "Fortnightly residual waste collections are proven to increase recycling rates and save tax payers money." • "If you recycle your card, paper, bottles, cans and plastics, that should make up the bulk of your household waste." • "If you recycle your food waste, your bin won't become smelly or fly- infested." It's just as important that the resources INDUSTRY OPINION July 2015 Local Authority Waste & Recycling 11 Peter Jones is a senior consultant with Eunomia Research & Consulting Each 400g wine bottle in the wrong bin costs the council at least 4p sector is able to confidently put forward the positives regarding recycling. I'd suggest starting with the point that recycling helps make Britain resource secure. Indeed, we need to convey the fact that many of the materials people recycle are reprocessed in the UK, and used by British industry, avoiding the need for imports. There is also the financial factor: recycling helps in keeping council tax down. If you put your glass bottles in the rubbish, they cost council taxpayers £80-100 per tonne to dispose of; if you put them in a bottle bank, they're worth at least £10 per tonne. Each 400g wine bottle that goes in the wrong bin therefore costs the council at least 4p. And finally there's the environmental message: recycling reduces carbon emissions. While recycling refuseniks are often climate change sceptics, most people are still motivated by doing something straightforward that reduces carbon emissions. If we're going to boost recycling, communication will be the key – although that's not to say it's a panacea. Nevertheless, it's time to strike back against the tabloid recycling myths, using whatever channels are open to us to combat the most prevalent negative messages and convey the facts that show the benefits of recycling. Last month, the Express Group accepted that two of its titles' stories regarding a recycling 'scandal' in the UK contained significant errors. In the stories, published way back in January, the Express described the 280,000 tonnes of material rejected from the recycling system as a 'scandal' without giving context to the figure – set against the 10m tonnes of household recycling collected, the national reject rate is just 2.7%. Both articles suggested that the reason for contamination in the recycling stream is confusion amongst residents regarding what can and can't be recycled given the multiple containers they are faced with. But this is inconsistent with the statistics the newspapers relied on, which show the highest level of rejects being recorded by authorities with single or two stream collections. One of the articles highlighted the multi-container recycling system in Newcastle-under-Lyme as an example of excessive complexity – yet the authority achieves a reject rate of zero. "This is another example of recycling getting a negative press based on preconceptions and misunderstandings rather than facts," says Peter Jones, a senior consultant at Eunomia Research & Consulting. His complaint to the Express Group resulted in one of the articles being substantially amended, whilst another has been withdrawn entirely. Jones has previously managed to persuade the Daily Telegraph and Daily Mail to withdraw or amend erroneous articles about waste and recycling. Read all about it

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