THIS week we have reported on claims that tonnes of waste that should be recycled has instead gone up in smoke.

Brighton and Hove City Council and residents across the city have been making efforts to improve how much we recycle.

It has included community schemes for composting food waste, and people making the effort to separate their waste at home into recycling goods and non recyclable goods.

We have all seen the examples of the harm that plastics can cause to our oceans, and a great many of us have made it our mission to do better to go green.

So it is a slap in the face for the whole city to learn that the contractor Veolia has been burning cardboard.

Tonnes of it, by all reports.

It fuels climate change and pollution, and undermines all of our efforts we make as a society.

Perhaps on occasion we might be prepared to accept that the company has had a difficult collection, or problems sorting out the waste.

Even if this was tolerable, it should be the exception. But it seems it is becoming far more routine.

Across the country, councils and residents are doing a far better job at making sure cardboard, plastics, tins, and glass bottles.

So Caroline Lucas is right to ask questions about Veolia and its role, and is right to point out that it is an outrage.

Serious action will be needed by the company, not just to hush our disquiet, but to actually address the problems.

We also need action from the government, otherwise we are entitled to turn around and ask: "What's the point?"