Recycling is it really saving the world?

New Rules: April 2026

As from the first of April this year new recycling rules have come into force across the UK.  All homes will have a food waste bin that will be collected weekly, a general waste bin that is collected every other week and a multi recycling waste bin for cardboard/paper, plastic/metal, and glass which is collected every other week alternating with the general waste.

This has been implemented to get the UK rate of recycling up to 65% by the year 2035.

At the moment Wales come out on top at 68.4%, Scotland, Northern Ireland and England are lower.  England I am ashamed to say is 44.6%.  

Weekly food waste goes to specialised plants where it is turned into renewable energy and fertilizer. Cardboard is recycled into more cardboard, glass is recycled into more glass and what they are now doing with plastic is incredible, new clothing fibres etc.

We in Cornwall have been doing this recycling for a while now, in fact according to Cornwall Council our rate is 52%.  Up until now in the UK it has been a postcode lottery whether you get all the various forms of recycling collected.  Of course this hasn't always gone down very well.  "Remember the days when there was only one bin?"  People moan, or "I spend all my time recycling it's a full time job," or "pavements always blocked with bins."

 I myself am amazed by the lack of black bags I now put out, about ten years ago I was putting around 4 or 5 black bags out every week for collection, now it's one or two, but I do feel sorry for families with young children because our black bags certainly increase when the grandchildren in nappies come to stay.  

We used to take our recycling down to the local supermarket.  Remember the big bins they used to have.  Which reminds me of a funny story.  We always saved the glass for recycling.  All the wine/whisky bottles, jam jars etc.  When they started overtaking the house we would take them down to the supermarket bins.  

Now Martin was the local GP in the area and has a penchant for a fine malt whisky, and I am ashamed to say would partake of the said substance from time to time, sometimes he was given a particularly nice/expensive one.  Well, whilst he was down at the bottle bank depositing our latest collection of household glass and bottles he spotted  a particularly fine and expensive malt whisky bottle he had as a  christmas present has a few precious drops left in it, so after depositing the other bottles, he left that one til last and with one arm casually draped over the bottle bank he decided to savour one last swig left in the bottle.  To his horror, one of his patients that he had probably recently advised to cut down on alcohol happened to walk past saw him and with a knowing smile said.  "Alright there, Doc?" and sauntered on past.

I do have a bit of a moan though, why is it that some people think that a bin is public property?  Now hear me out, it's not that I object to people being tidy but our bins have to live permantely at the bottom of our steps.  The refuse collectors are quite rightly strict about what goes in the bin.  You can put your dog crap in the bin if it is in a bag in a black bag.  We don't have a dog anymore (RIP Ralphie) but several times we have gone to put a black bag into the bin to find a passerby had dumped his dogs crap in our bin.  Yes it was in a small bag, I give you that, but I am only 5'2' and cannot get this small bag out of the bin without falling in myself.  Also, the bin men do not always hitch the bin up to the cart to empty it, they just take the black bags out and lob them in the cart leaving the poo bag still in the bottom of the bin where it festers and stinks and why should I deal with that?  So, unsociably we have fitted bin locks to our bins.  I also once found a half-eaten ice-cream cone in there too, AND a nappy.  Sorry rant over.

Anyway, to conclude, change can often be inconvenient but I think these small changes we do at home all goes to reducing landfill and so does help to save the world.