AIBU to think clothing donation bins just encourage fly-tipping?

[Notyouthful]

As a litter womble, I want to say that there is no need for clothing donations bins. They just create fly tipping,

Also I doubt that any of the items in the bins are suitable for sale in charity shops.

Anyone who dumps bags and other crap by these bins are fly tipping!

There have been bins removed from areas near to me and the fly tipping has gone overnight.

Take your donations which are still suitable to wear to a charity shops.

Also don’t put out bags which you get posted for clothing donations. As people with drugs or alcohol issues, have driven around the area and picking up the bags. Or the charities are bogus. As found these with company numbers and looking at them on Companies House - they are for car mechanics the other side of the Uk

If you have issues taking stuff to a charity shop, get a friend or someone who drives. Or search for charities that will pick up donations

About 6 miles from where I live, they have a charity shop within a tip. Doing a clear out - you can donate stuff which has life in it and dump the broken, worn out or obsolete stuff in the tip in one visit.

Of course but its the idiots who put bags outside the bins when there are signs NOT to do this.

Some people can only afford to buy cheap clothes. Even if it is a false economy.

As there are clothing bins available nearby for clothing, I will put old clothing in there.

Most charity shops will not sell any stuff dumped outside opening hours as its deemed as fly tipping. Many have a sign saying this. As no idea if foxes etc urinated on the bags

I use a Salvation Army bin. It says on their website that the point is keep clothes out of landfill. Everything is resold, reused or recycled.

I just want the stuff out of my house and as far as possible not in landfill. If someone takes it to sell I don't really mind. It's a pain to add schlepping to the charity shop during my working week to my to do list especially as you have to ring them beforehand and get interrogated.

This is clearly not the charity taking them.

When I had some furniture collected for a charity- they came in a large van with the charity name on it.

I wonder if it's the location, ours are at Tesco and there are visible cameras and they are right opposite the petrol garage which is staffed until late, I've never seen fly tipping near them but if people did they would be easily caught

We (me and another mum in our free time) do local free Clothes and Toys Swaps to help combat waste locally. Specifically aimed at women and children - clothes, maternity items, toys, etc. We do our best.

The town I live in no longer has clothing bins for that very reason.

Maybe this is because you need a van to fit furniture in, but it’s fine to load up a small car with a few clothes recycling bags. They’re generally smaller than furniture.

Had about ten bags/boxes of clothing and small things - ornaments, bedding taken from me by British Heart Foundation and it was in the same size van. Probably picked up furniture too on the same route

Many people have mobility issues and find it easier to put out clothing bags, or go to nearby clothing bins, than trek to a charity shop in the centre of town. We give away the same stuff regardless of where it's going.
I used to offer it for free on social media, but got sick of CFs not collecting when they said they would or asking for extras.

British heart foundation have the vans because they do furniture delivery and pick up. Smaller charities likely don’t. There may well be scammy clothing pick up things going on, but a charity not having a branded van to collect doorstep bags of clothing doesn’t feel like a good enough reason to say it’s clearly dodgy.

The items in the bins don't just go to charity. What isn't good enough to sell and use gets cut up and bagged as rags and sold to motor parts suppliers etc for garages.
Ds works in a garage and he had some it was things like old scout uniform, random clothing etc all in rectangles. They pay around £30 a bag full. So whilst it's not all decent enough to sell or use , it gets used in other ways

I actually know someone who works as a driver emptying clothing bins and he says so much is unusable due to it being dumped outside the bins, a lot of the time the bins are empty but it only takes one lazy person to dump a few bags on the floor then everyone else will assume that they are full and follow suit. They constantly get broken into as well and they get all sorts left there despite there being clear signage saying clothes and shoes only.

I don't really understand this (and the lack of imagination is impressive).

Obviously no-one should be fly-tipping. Rule that out of the debate.

Clothing banks are great for me because:

Charity shops are VERY fussy about what they take and are often closed to new donations.

I'm disabled and sometimes can't drive for months at a time. I can't access charity shops in this, let alone multiple ones to try and get one to take then.

It's too much to ask a friend to do this, but one run to a clothing bank is much easier.

I think you have an unrealistic view of charity shop availability OP. Personally I just want to avoid contributing to landfill

You can have teeshirts, jumpers and tracksuit bottoms that might not sell in a charity shop but people would be happy to have.

Sounds like the people on your estate need hobbies OP.

I can actually imagine your local group chat. Lots of pearl clutching going on for you to come here to give a bit of a lecture.

I'm not hauling my arse down to charity shops to get turned away. I have a life. I don't care where the door step bags go, as long as the get used for something.

I sell anything decent on Vinted myself. The rest goes in fabric recycling… which isn’t the same as a charity donation.

They have taken a lot of the bins away in my area because of this.

Where I live I had understood they were not supposed to be for stained etc. clothes for recycling - there are other places to donate those - but for saleable second-hand.

But there are always piles of fly-tipped textiles next to them so they are being closed and taken away.

Anglo Doorstep Collections operate across virtually the whole country. They collect free of charge and you don't have to be in. I booked a collection on a Saturday for the next Monday, which was really convenient.

There used to be clothing banks at a supermarket near us. For a long time there were no issues. Then they stopped being emptied regularly. When they were full people left bags of clothes beside them. This attracted fly tipping of all sorts of junk, and rats. The pile rapidly grew to a ridiculous size.
Despite multiple complaints and the risk to public health, the Council washed their hands of responsibility. The supermarket tried to get the clothing bank sponsor to clean up the mess, but they too wouldn't. I believe the supermarket eventually paid for the flytipping to be removed and pest control measures for the rats. When the rubbish was cleared the clothing banks disappeared and have not been replaced.
What was odd is that other clothing banks in the town haven't attracted fly tipping to that extent. I guess one person dumped stuff and others thought it was fair game to add to it.