& BOO for the City.
The former has just come top of the class for the least amount of waste sent to landfill (just 7% - the lowest in the country), whilst the latter has apparently buried a whopping 93% of its refuse (which is the highest in the country). Tower Hamlets is also featured in the league of shame as it is home to the smallest percentage of households who recycle (11.8%).
Councils need to sharpen their act, tho’, as there be new targets ahead, and it won’t be too long before the jolly, light breeze of recycling turns into a tornado of anti-refuse fascism (and those of you who have seen Serial Mom will know how serious this can be). The quangoid Waste Strategy 2007 wants to see us:
reducing the amount of household waste not re-used, recycled or composted from more than 22.2 million tonnes in 2000 by 29% to 15.8 million tonnes in 2010.
Um, that’s quite a lot.
Greenwich is clearly proactive about this. Londonist thinks the key lies in clear signposting, plenty of accurate information (available in a range of formats) and reliable service: in our experience many councils have cuddly green websites, but the reality of trying to get your recycled bit to the right destination can be a nightmare.
By the way, we shouldn’t be too hard on the City, as it is hardly blessed with space to swing a recycled cat, let alone shiny arrays of recycling facilities. And its resident population is heavily outnumbered by ‘faceless’ office types who may kowtow to a corporate conscience but are hardly constrained by normal domestic considerations.
What all of this shows most of all is just what a hugely varied landscape (in every sense) London comprises.
Photo recycled from D. G. Jones’ flickr stream.
