Thousands of homes to get weekly recycling

8:22am Tuesday 13th March 2007

Weekly recycling collections are being extended to 13,000 extra homes across Brighton and Hove.

From March 26, households in 220 more streets will have their kerbside recycling collected weekly instead of fortnightly.

Most homes outside of the city centre currently receive a fortnightly collection and Brighton and Hove City Council hopes the extra frequency will increase recycling rates.

Gill Mitchell, chairwoman of the environment committee, said: "The switch to a weekly collection will make it easier for people remember when to put their recycling box out and is part of our ongoing work to encourage recycling.

"The changes affect streets in various parts of the city and letters are going out this week to notify all households who will be receiving the new weekly service.

"Paper, cans, glass, cardboard, plastic bottles and household batteries can all be recycled through the kerbside collection service."

Green councillor Georgia Wrighton said this was a step in the right direction but should have been introduced years ago.

She said: "To encourage more recycling we should be rolling out weekly collections to the whole city and increasing the range of materials we collect.

"To help residents reduce their waste we should also be collecting compostables, like kitchen waste."

Recycling rates have risen from 24.5 per cent in 2006 to 28 per cent this year - still shy of the 30 per cent Government target.

Fines for those not recycling were introduced last year to help boost the rates and have helped encourage scores of households to begin filling their black boxes.

No-one has yet to receive a fine but Coun Mitchell said that a number of people had received warnings from the council before changing their ways.

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