I don’t want to wash up chicken packets and jars of mayonnaise!!

[ChristmasBaby2026]

My council like many have recently changed our recycling. We now have:

• a bin for paper and card
• a bin for “mixed recycling”
• the food bin
• the black bin
• the garden bin (which I have to pay extra for 😡)

The only substantial change other than the number of bins to put things in is they will now collect glass whereas we previously had to go to the bottle bank.

But it now means they are now only collecting our black bin once every THREE weeks (and currently not for 4 because the new system has stupidly started on a recycling week).

How are families supposed to only have rubbish collected once every three weeks? There is simply no way.

I do recycle but I have always drawn the line at washing up gross things like packets of mince and jars of mayonnaise. But apparently the council have decided people have nothing better to do. I wouldn’t resent it so much if I thought it was actually making a difference but my landfill mayonnaise jar is not the main problem here!

We’ve had this for about a year. And the black bin is much smaller than it used to be. fits about 4 bin bags in

we don’t manage to be honest, we go to the dump very regularly!

Yes, but I am not hundreds of thousands of people. I am one person. So whether I do it or not makes zero difference.

But you’re the one creating all of this waste. Why shouldn’t you have to do some work to dispose of it properly?

Such a shit excuse for not have a gram of social responsibility.

Do people really have a bag in their kitchen for everything? I just put clean jars etc on the drainer and take them out of an evening. Cardboard goes on the side and then the children come and jump on it to flatten it before I take it out. I go down the stairs and round the corner but it takes less than a minute. There isn’t any excuse for not recycling.

I did not rinse my recycling until one day I had to deal with maggots feasting on my tuna cans. Fucking gross.
Its not hard. Honest.

I can’t believe people are too lazy to rinse a jar. Still at least it will be future generations who have to deal with the consequences so I have no skin in the game.

Presumably these people aren’t teaching their offspring social responsibility either.

The vermin get used to it as well. We seem to have lost track of why refuse is collected. It is to prevent the spread of vermin and disease. Anything beyond that is optional. Bins containing food waste need emptying weekly to prevent disease and vermin.

I've already said, life's busy enough without adding more stuff to do. I genuinely see no issue with putting it in the main bin.

You are one person of course but multiply your attitude by hundreds of thousands and you are definitely part of a bigger problem. Engage in recycling and you are part of a bigger solution. It’s social conscience that gets most of us doing it. Not just less going to landfill, recycling uses less energy than making from new

Yeah, I saw that you’re busier than anyone else.

Small silicone spatulas get anything out of a jar

It's your rubbish, why shouldn't you wash it out? Do you expect someone else to wash your dishes too? It takes very little time - less time than this thread.

Washing your rubbish. Do you realise how crazy that sounds.

Yes, sounds like the same program. I thought doing what I could was the least I could do to help them

Recycling anything but metal and glass does nearly zero for the environment. Stop bothering. Put it all in black bin liners and don’t worry about it.

Oh dear. Statistics not your strong point?

We had black bins every 3 weeks and managed fine. When they introduced recycling soft plastics at the curb side made a massive difference. You can probably recycle these at the local supermarket. Once everything else is recycled there isn’t a lot left for the actual bin

Not crazy at all. It's going to be recycled. It makes sense for us to put our recycling out clean. We are not pigs.

Because you are the end user. Why are you wanting to push the responsibility for your rubbish onto someone else? You use it. You deal with it

There isn’t any food waste in the black bin if you have separate food waste collections.

It's a fact.
If I started to do it all properly, and everybody else who doesn't still didn't, my doing so would make no change.
If everybody else chose to do it all properly, and I didn't, it still wouldn't matter.

I alone make zero difference to the state of the world.

@ChristmasBaby2026 I do recycle but I have always drawn the line at washing up gross things like packets of mince and jars of mayonnaise. But apparently the council have decided people have nothing better to do.

The best outcome here would be for you to get a job as a bin worker.

That way, you would develop an appreciation for people who do hands-on work, and you would also lose your princess complex in the process.

@sharkstale I alone make zero difference to the state of the world.

Tell me you are bad at mathematics without telling me that you are bad at mathematics.

Except I'm not.
I'm not talking about everybody collectively. I am talking about myself.