Council not giving extra allowance for those whose bin dates not changed

[Cozc]

Depending on your bin day and when Christmas falls, your bin day can change. Those who have theirs changed, council allows residents put up to 3 bags of black bags by their rubbish wheelie bin.

Then what happens in areas of the town where the bin days are unchanged, people are putting excess rubbish in street litter bins or fly tip bags. Litter bins are not designed for rubbish.

If you do host Christmas gatherings at your home, you produce the same amount of rubbish regardless of the day of the week Christmas Day falls on. Then tip has reduced hours for the Xmas/NY period.

My parents were able to their late neighbours’ wheelie bin. As both died this year. Probably won’t have the opportunity again as the property has gone onto the market.

If councils allow all households an extra allowance for rubbish, there would be less rubbish about

Our bin day only moved by one day. Recycling is always as much as you have as long as it’s either cardboard just put out or you bag it in a clear bag.

Waste is only ever with the lid shut. We do have a food bin as well. Collections once a Fortnight for each type of rubbish apart from food.

If it helps future gift wrap, t k maxx had lovely fabric gift bags recently for very reasonable price. So a few medium size means at least your own children’s gifts less disposable wrap. I imagine on sale now.

i can take soft plastics to tesco
but tetrapaks are so annoying that i would have to drive to the tip, what a waste of energy!

Our black bin is fine, we aren't anywhere near capacity for it, but we are completely out of room for recycling (to the point where I'm contemplating having to put some of it in the black bin). If you have more recycling than will fit in the (not huge) boxes/bags they give you, they won't collect. Slots at the tip need to be booked and 'sell out' quickly.

I can criticise my council for much but they do waste and recycling well - long may it continue. We have weekly : paper and card box, plastic and metal box, food bin and non recyclable rubbish in bags. Garden waste in large stickered green wheelies or green bags that you pay for. Can put small electricals out next to bin. Batteries and small electrical to the library. The only requirement they have is that cardboard is cut up to fit the recycling box. The recycling centre aka the tip has become stricter - booking slots since Covid with proof, different areas for commercial and general public and very eagle eyed on what goes where. Very efficient and helpful, though. Lots of street corner textile and cardboard mini units.

I’m not being smug, I’m being very grateful indeed especially after seeing the paltry service given to so many others on here 😕 My DD, in the next London borough over, paying equally eye watering council tax, gets nothing like as good a regime.

But that depends on how good your council is with its recycling. Ours won’t take any wrapping paper if it has sellotape on, so , either you rip off all the bits with sellotape , or you just bin it, they don’t recycle plastic bags, plastic film, crisp packets etc, so they also end up in the rubbish bin and, if like us, you have bought presents for your grandkids which they open at your house, you do generate more rubbish/ recycling. Before they introduced bins, our council would take whatever extra rubbish you put out at Christmas, now, if the lid won’t shut, it’s left, maybe just for one bin collection cycle, they could make an exception, after all, at the end of the day,we do pay for it

Our bin is being collected 4 days late. We had so many people over christmas that for the second year we paid to have the bin emptied by a local licenced waste carrier. They charge £15 for it to be emptied and they came on Saturday. It is worth it to us, as I dont want the stinking food rubbish (we dont have a food waste collection here) in the car going to the tip. Our recycling is also full, and we will have to go to the tip with some recycling as they dont come for another 1.5 weeks.

All the sticky tape needs removing too.

I don’t buy it. But people who give gifts to me/ my family still do. And the recyclable gift wrap ends up in their houses and the non-recyclable in mine. Have you really never come across the concept of gift-giving? 🤷‍♀️

Then bag it all up and take to a sort it centre. Most wrapping paper can be recycled it shouldn't be in the black bin anyway. Food waste in food bin, and all bottles and cans etc can be recycled. What exactly is going in.the black bin that can't be recycled??

food waste is not recycled in my area

I think three things can be true - it's on households to plan and manage waste, but also on supermarket regulators to create the right incentives along the whole food and waste chain. Finally it's for councils to use their resources sensibly and provide the right waste collection for the types of housing stock they have. If they expect every house with a garden to do effective composting. for example, which doesn't seem outrageous - there needs to be more support for how to do it. I've tried twice in my previous home and set it up wrong somehow, and both times ended up with a pile of heaving smelly maggots and flies but no actual compost (!)

Then there's the broader waste issues of our working and purchasing behaviours. If you work super long hours you might get a lot of presents delivered. Plus, many shops don't have a full range on the shelf now and you must order specific items. So before Christmas you already have loads of additional recyclable waste - amazon boxes and packaging etc. We had extra rubbish on Xmas eve from simply unpacking and wrapping our children's gifts, or customising the delivery boxes to look like presents.

Many posters have said what can't be recycled. I don't have the space to keep the recycling until I have enough to make a dump/recycling run worthwhile and even if I did I don't want to waste time at the weekend sitting in a queue at the dump. As well as that it's extra car journeys which surely can't be good for the environment.

That's unusual, and I think by early next year every council has to offer it.

I can’t believe people are throwing away gift bags - surely they get reused a lot of times? Just take the tag off!

We’ve also started using Christmas bags made of material which you can reuse again and again. Even if it ends up in someone else’s house they can reuse.

Love this idea. One of the many reasons why it is a good idea to know your neighbours.

I’m also lucky to live in an area where you can have an extra recycling bin for no extra charge, and I have the space for it. Would definitely recommend checking if you get a lot of deliveries!

Yes exactly, it's not a consolation prize for the inconvenience of having your bin date changed or christmas = more waste produced -its acknowledging that 2 week collection (or however often your non recyclables are collected) = 1 full bin of rubbish therefore the extra 1/2 days worth has to go somewhere.

Don't worry OP your council will soon realise other places don't bother with things like rationality and stop giving anyone extra days - mine doesn't and never has.

thanks to this thread i have just checked and it turns out extra recycling can be taken

• All rubbish should be contained within the rubbish bin with the lid closed as this reduces the likely-hood of animals and birds accessing the waste. Extra rubbish will not be taken.
• Extra recycling can be presented next to the bin in white or clear bags, except for glass which must be put into the recycling bin

Lots of us are saying
a) recycling bins are already full, with fewer collections over xmas
b) food waste bins are already more than full, with fewer collections over xmas

What is a 'sort it centre'? We have one local recycling and refuse centre which is booked up. This is truthfully what it's like living in some parts of London.

As I said above I don't mind working out what to do - as others, putting flat cardboard behind cupboards, in fact we put some clean recycling in the loft! But it gets irksome with so many continuing to just deny it's a thing.

We have half size black bins which are collected every two weeks.

Our council will not take any wrapping paper in the recycling, not even recyclable, as they say most of the paper labelled recyclable is actually too thin for them to recycle, so it has to go in the black bin. They will only take plain brown paper in the recycling. We aren’t allowed any bags in addition to the small black bin this year either.

Doesn’t your council give you a leaflet with revised collection dates? Or an email? Ours do both. It’s quite well planned …. They don’t just ‘decide to turn up’.

Not everyone has food waste deliveries or access to somewhere to put a compost bin.

Why on earth are you throwing gift bags away?! They can be reused - don’t you know about the “mums’ gift bag mafia”?

You could ask a neighbour who lives alone, as I do, if you can put stuff in their bins.