Is being green a con when it comes to recycling?

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Eva S

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By recycling our rubbish are we just helping to keep environmental agencies profitable when they meet government subsidy targets or should we recieve a percentage rebate too, considering we pay local council tax on rubbish collection.
 
Well when it comes to UK we are definitely just helping to keep environmental agencies profitable as well as trying to comply (although in vain) to the standards set by the EU.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/politics/7843070.stm

After reading the above article, it clearly proves one thing. We aren't being encouraged to recycle, we are being forced to recycle. Instead of actually making recycling a truly environmental issue, the government instead just makes it a financial one by planning yet another stealth tax.

What is bizzare, is that I already have 3 bins at my UK house. One for general waste, one for cardboard/paper/plastic bottles and another for green (garden) waste/glass. I have all those at a significant increase in my council tax as it is, or in other words I am being charged for this priviledge.

Whilst I do try an do my bit by sorting my waste like many other people, i do not take it lightly when there is a possibility of my bins being tagged and me being charged extra on the top of my already extortionate council tax fee. No offence but by sorting my waste I am already doing half the job for them. I also happen to have a huge problem with the fact that the weekly collections have been scrapped and the rubbish is now collected fortnightly. If you have a large family, there is simply no way of reducing the waste when almost every single item these days comes in a box 6 times its size!!! Perhaps government should adress the manufacturers/packagers instead of penalising tax payers in order to raise yet more cash for their pathetic failed policies.

I also happen to be fortunate enough to be living between UK and Spain. Here in Spain, my rubbish collection is part of a community fee (UK's council tax equivalent) which is not only a small fraction of what I pay in UK but also includes such as community private security and free sat TV. Here in Spain my rubbish is also collected daily (YES DAILY!!) apart from Sundays or public holidays. All refuse goes into the same bin - we don't sort our rubbish here in Spain.

Which brings me to ask this question - how does Spain and other countries in Europe manage to do this at fraction of the cost and still adhere to EU recycling targets, whilst in UK we sort the rubbish for them and government still tries to screw us even more???

If you figure it out please let me know :)
 
yeah tooo right,but also the @rse has fallen out of the waste paper /cardboard market at the moment and it actually costs councils to get rid of it instead of companies payin for it,so DO YOU think the council is storin it till the price comes back up or are the recyclin trucks ive seen dumpin it in landfill just a figment of me immagination!!!
 
a couple years ago, when i knew, the recycler paid our town $1m to process our recyclables.
however, that wasn't nearly enough to run the town, so it made no sense to try to pay individuals.
clearly, if you choose, you can take your stuff to some place that does recycling, and get money for it.
generally, you pay as much to take it there as you get paid for the stuff.
it just makes more sense to have the recycle folks pick it up.

as for "helping to keep environmental agencies profitable" it just makes sense to recycle.
it saves trees.
it saves electricity -- aluminum smelting is a very large electricity user.
it saves oil -- any time you recycle plastic, you save some oil, although clearly not on a 1-to-1 ratio.
as time goes on, the value of recycling will become more and more apparent.
 
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