Ealing Council has been trumpeting this in their latest Around Ealing as well. I think it's great that people are doing so much more than before, and there are lots of reasons for that including the improvement in kerbside collections.
There is an unresolved problem though, which is that 35% is nowhere near enough. In London the government's estimates are that we probably have only about 5 years of landfill capacity left (and I've seen fewer quoted as well). So this is a very pressing problem and I note that Ealing does not seem to have targets for increasing recycling, just an intent. I believe that people would recycle far more if they were provided with the facility to do it, whether that is through council collections, take-back schemes in partnership with retailers, or other ways. But however we do it, we need to be aiming for 80-90% recycling rates -- easily do-able with a bit of effort from everyone. Oh, and if we don't then landfill taxes are shooting up so we'll all pay a lot more Council Tax in the meantime. |