Recycling Articles : Are fines & penalties the answer to encourage recycling?

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The amount of rubbish that we in the UK throw away without giving any thought to if we could recycle, has recently been firmly in the spotlight, there has been much talk about what the local councils and government could have in the pipeline for households with some of the measures including changing to fortnightly collections, giving out green bins, fining, pay as you throw schemes and fines after tagging your bin with a micro chip.

However are fines and penalties the answer to encourage more people to think before they throw, is tagging your household waste no more than an invasion on your privacy and a way to get more money out of you?

The micro chip in the wheelie bin lid has been in place in Germany for some time now and local councils claim that is had indeed given households the encouragement they need to recycle instead of just casually throwing everything into the same bin.

The amount of households recycling has increased and the amount of waste has dropped, which of course was the whole point to the scheme in the first place and as such has been seen as a great success. Which of course has led to the scheme going ahead here in the UK, with around 500,000 wheelie bins already having been secretly tagged with the micro chip. The chip is around the size of a penny and detects what comes out of your bin when it is tipped into the lorry.

Another way encouragement will be given to recycle is with the introduction of pay as you throw, this means that you will be charged per kilo for all the rubbish you throw away which is classed as non recyclable. This means in effect that some households could pay around £25 per month for the privilege of having their rubbish removed.

Other fines and penalties which are in the spotlight include being fined £100 for putting your rubbish out on the wrong day, this is a penalty which is aimed at ensuring the fortnightly collections that have been imposed on us work properly.

Along with this those who fail to close their bin lids properly, put out extra rubbish along with their bins or put the wrong rubbish in the wrong bin can be similarly fined. Any fines which are imposed on the householder go into the pocket of the council with some councils admitting that they have already collected fines this way which amount to £200,000.

Whether or not the fines will work remains to be seen, but it seems the council and government will do just about anything to bring to the householder’s attention to the fact that we cannot keep on as we have in the past, which has led to landfills being unmanageable.

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