Test your recycling knowledge

Rochdale residents who are struggling to sort their paper from their plastics can head to a special recycling advice event at Morrisons, Kingsway this week.

On Thursday 10 October, from 10am to 4pm, recycling advisors will be on hand to give advice as part of the ‘Right stuff. Right bin’ campaign currently being piloted in the borough.

‘Right stuff. Right bin’ is a recycling bin collection trial with approximately 1600 homes in the Newbold and St Ann’s estate areas, which aims to educate residents about what things go in the right bin.

Councillor Jacqui Beswick, Cabinet Member for Place and Regulation added: “Improved recycling rates could save a colossal £25m a year across Greater Manchester, money that could be better spent on schools, libraries, other public services and community projects.” 

“Recycling contamination is an important issue and our refuse team don’t have the resource to sort out contaminated recycling at the kerbside. We really appreciate the efforts that residents have been making.”

Under the scheme, run by Rochdale Borough Council in partnership with Recycle for Greater Manchester, recycling crews have been leaving green ‘thank you’ tags on bins where households are recycling the right items in the right bins.

Households that get it wrong are left a red apology tag on their uncollected recycling bins with a reminder of the right items that can go in the bin. They are also asked to remove the wrong items and make sure that only the ‘right stuff’ goes in the ‘right bin’ for the next collection day. 

Around 190 red tags were left during the first collection on 20 September, 139 on the 4 October collection and final tags will be circulated on 18 October.

Martin Taylor, Environmental Services Manager at Rochdale Borough Council said “We would like to encourage local residents to come along to the event, where we will be able to answer their questions and we’ve also uploaded information about the Right Stuff. Right Bin campaign onto our website to provide further assistance.”

If successful, the campaign could be rolled out across the borough and Greater Manchester.

More information and FAQs about the campaign can be found on www.rochdale.gov.uk/bins.