Swift service roll-out pushes Midlothian up recycling table

The council has made a huge leap from its position at the bottom end of Scotland's recycling table to achieve a 24.9% recycling rate from July to September, 2005.

Midlothian's “Let's Recycle” recycling scheme has been swiftly introduced

Midlothian had recycled just 4.7% of residents' waste in the 2004/5 financial year.

The increase has been achieved through the introduction of a new kerbside recycling scheme in 2005. In April last year, around 32,000 gardened properties received brown bins for garden waste – followed by the roll out of kerbside collection red and blue boxes for glass, cans, paper and plastic.

Tied to a “Let's Recycle” message, the scheme is an alternate weekly system, with garden waste collected one week and residual waste the next. Kerbside boxes are collected every week.

Councillor Derek Milligan, cabinet member for commercial services, said: “This is great news and evidence of the strong support for kerbside recycling in communities. We know we are only part way there and have more homes to include in our Let's Recycle programme before April.

“Having successfully introduced kerbside recycling, our message will move in the coming months to reducing and re-using as well as recycling waste,” he added.

Roll-out
The council rolled out its entire green waste collection scheme within April 2005, then its dry recyclables service to all households from May to November 2005. Now, only flats and rural villages are yet to be provided with full kerbside recycling services

Rural households are to receive their kerbside boxes once an efficient collection route is established. Residents living in flats are being consulted on the best options to get them recycling.

The council is set to complete its borough-wide kerbside roll out by the beginning of the 2006/07 financial year.

A spokeswoman for the council said: “We are one of the later councils to introduce kerbside recycling, but we have had a very intense roll out in 2005 and clearly it is having a real impact. We know there are still council's much higher than us, but we hope to be there in the future.”

Once the scheme is up and running in 100% of the borough the council will set about making small changes in order to enhance the full potential of the service.