Taking out the trash day

One of today's top news stories is Environment Secretary David Miliband's proposal for increased charges for landfill waste and correspondingly, council tax cuts for recycling waste, announced as part of a broader package of measures of the UK Government's waste strategy.

Of course, devolution means that this strategy doesn't apply to Wales and that the Welsh Assembly Government will have its own considerations and priorities for addressing waste disposal and its last publication on the subject was the snappily-titled Wise About Waste, which was released in 2002. Naturally, the mainstream media don't mention this difference between England and the rest of the UK...

The idea, to me, sounds sound. It's about incentivizing greener behaviour, rather than the same council tax charge applying to all regardless of how much they recycle. At the same time though, we must also recognize the onus on supermarkets and large retailers to drastically reduce the amount of packaging that goes straight into the bin. As the natty pie chart on the right here also shows, the significant opportunity to avoid food scraps going straight to landfill should also be seized - whether towards biomass energy or for compost.