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June 1, 2007 - Wasting away

To Peterborough, to mark 15 years of the City as one of the four Environment Cities. A lot of good things done during that time, but a long way still to travel.

Waste inevitably pops up as one of the biggest issues. Peterborough has the second best recycling performance of any comparative local authority in the UK- at more than 40%. That’s fantastic. But it generates more waste per person than most other places in the UK! Which neatly makes the distinction between waste minimisation and recycling: however good your recycling may be, the primary focus here has to be on reducing total waste per person.

There are many people in local government who think that this just can’t be done – but they’re wrong. There are huge variations in per capita waste levels from one local authority to the next. And specific policy and education interventions lie at the heart of those differences.

At which point in the discussion the work of the redoubtable Professor Hosking is raised to demonstrate what local communities can do, without any official backing from government, given the right kind of leadership. When the news broke of the success of Modbury in Devon in eliminating the use of all plastic bags (with all 43 shopkeepers and traders signed up to a joint campaign), the Professor was overwhelmed with requests for advice as to how to do it from all over the country.

Politicians constantly underestimate just how much people are prepared to do in terms of addressing their own waste responsibilities, and the ingenuity with which they’re prepared to set about doing something on that score – just so long as they’re given a chance.

Posted on June 1, 2007 3:07 PM | | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (0)

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