Are recycling plants becoming too picky?

CERTAINLY some council staff check recycling bins for material that can’t be recycled, but Steven Glover moans about councils having to incinerate or send to landfill up to 15 per cent of recyclate collected because of contamination (Mail). What does anyone expect local councils do to reduce this percentage if they don’t do checks? Incidentally, once waste/recycling is put in a bin provided by the council, it becomes the property of the council — so its staff are perfectly entitled to check it. JOHN F. CRAWFORD, Lytham, Lancs. WE PAy our councils large sums to provide us with basic services such as refuse collection. I assist in the recycling drive for environmental reasons, but I don’t think it’s our job, as householders, to do more than separate basic items. I don’t know by sight which plastic is recyclable: a simple colour code would assist. Surely future pay rises and councillors’ expenses could be used to fund the kind of services we deserve. ALEC TELFORD, Darlington. LAST week, my grandson mowed the lawn for us, emptying the grass into our green bin which was almost full with shrub cuttings. He’s a good lad and also put into the green bin six golf-ball-size apples that had fallen off our small apple tree, placing them on top of the grass. When the bin lorry arrived to take our garden waste, the bin man looked in the bin, saw the apples and duly stuck a ticket on the bin saying the ‘wrong waste’ had been put in it. My wife saw this happen and removed the apples but the bin men still refused to take it, saying there could be more underneath. The next collection isn’t for two weeks. After a few choice words from my very irate wife, the bin men went on their merry way saying they were ‘only doing their job’. All this for a service for which we pay an extra £25 a year. RAY WILLIAMS, Bourne, Lincs.