This week Sheffield City Council announced £25 million of tax payers' money will be spent on cleaning up the environment. The new Liberal Democrat manifesto aims to increase recycling opportunities in Sheffield this year to make it ‘A City of Opportunity’.
Councillor Shaffaq Mohammed, Cabinet Member for Climate Change and the Local Environment said:
“The waste management team are currently writing a new waste strategy for the City and this will include delivering our commitment of more recycling. We anticipate a new kerbside recycling service will be introduced to most households in the by the end of next year.”
Currently Sheffield City Council provide blue bins for paper and card recycling for every household, which are collected once a month. But there are still a number of households that are not in blue bin collection places, such as difficult to reach rural areas and some of the city centre, including student accommodation.
Councillor Mohammed said that the council’s budget of £25 million will not stretch to providing the recycling services in these areas.
“There are currently no plans to make this service 100% coverage as the costs of doing this are disproportionate. The guidance from government is that where it is difficult to provide separate recycling services, including on the basis of cost the local authority may opt not to provide a service.”
Christine Bell, a final year Sports Science student at Sheffield Hallam University thinks that the recycling bins in student areas would benefit the environment greatly. She said:
“We should definitely have it. If you think about it, students’ halls of residents throw out dozens of glass bottles and waste paper from assignments.
"I remember in my first year at my halls of residents we took out three or four black bin bags full of bottles. We didn’t think to recycle them because we didn’t know where to take them.
“I don't have a car so it makes it difficult to get to a recycling centre so if we did have those blue bins we'd be throwing out a lot less rubbish as you can only fit a limited amount of stuff in those black bins. We'd be able to fit twice the amount of rubbish in there whilst recycling half of it."
The council do provide free green sacks for garden waste that they collect, which have been a success, with over 200,000 collected. Yet this is still only a third of them used, but councillor Mohammed remains optimistic. He said: "Perhaps the spring weather will see this change. "
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