Occasional Scribbles

I arrive home to find a red sticker on my recycling bin and felt the stirrings of anger before I’d even looked at it. It read: NOTICE in big bold print, followed by

NO BLACK SACKS
or PLASTIC BAGS

Please place recycling loose
within the bin.
Failure to do so will result
in rejection of your Bin

Reading the odious message infuriated me. I had not put my RR (recycling rubbish) in any bags or containers whatsoever. I established that this was not allowed when I first got this unwanted extra green bin since people I spoke to on the matter, seemed to be of differing opinions as to whether this was acceptable. Some thought that you had to put RR into bags but that you couldn’t put PR (proper rubbish) in plastic bags/black bags and that it had to go into the bin as was – disgusting! Since confirming that RR had to be placed loose and into the bins I have complied. As it must be washed as well, it doesn’t need to be wrapped in anything whereas PR obviously needs to be or it will smell and attract flies and rats etc. Though I have had an outbreak of maggots, flies, rats and other bugs around the wretched thing but this is because it sits there for two whole weeks prior to being collected under this medieaval scheme. Even the RR has attracted flies and beetles despite it being washed.

However what is so irritating is the ATTITUDE of these people. Recycling is not compulsory – yet. I personally am not convinced that it is beneficial anyway. Other countries, the Netherlands I think for one, have already tried this scheme and found it seriously wanting and the benefits did not outway the negatives and it has been abandoned. Either way, I object to being threatened in such a way. Frankly I don;t care if the do ‘reject’ the bin. If they do, they will lose revenue, albeit not much since my contribution isn’t a lot, and I will simply go back to doing what I did before the green bin, that is, I shall burn all the burnable stuff and put the rest in the PR bin. Job done. Matters not to me.

I pay a substantial council tax considering the size of my property which is a small cottage in the country, and the fact that I live in a rual place means that I benefit very little from other services from the council. Ther is no street lighting, parks, regular buses, leisure centres or anything really that I might wish to use. I feel that I pay this huge tax just to have my rubbish removed and now that it is only removed fortnightly they have effectively cut my service in half but have not cut the cost. And now they are treating me as if I am a school girl, ticking me off with officious stickers with ludicrous threats. They must be aware that people are angry and annoyed by this cut in service so you would think that they would adopt a more polite way of sending a message. If they are not careful I may just send one myself – there’s a lot of dog muck that needs clearing up around here. Um, where shall I put it?