‘That’s not recycling – it’s fly-tipping’
Saturday 3rd January 2009, 10:05AM GMT.
Despite States Works vehicles being out in force to cope with a backlog of recycled material at bring banks yesterday, scenes such as this at Chouet were repeated elsewhere around the island. (Picture by Adrian Miller, 0696932)
RECYCLING areas throughout the island were turned into a dumping ground yesterday as bring banks overflowed.
People blamed the Public Services Department for not arranging to have the sites emptied more frequently over the festive period.
Huge quantities of glass were simply left in front of recycling banks by frustrated islanders.
The bottles caused a lot of extra work for States Works staff because collection lorries could not reverse up to the bring banks to empty them.
Instead, staff have to pick up all the material placed infront of the bank by hand.
One woman, who stacked her bottles in front of the bins at Chouet, said that the chaos was the department’s fault.
‘They [PSD] should have organised for the banks to be emptied more regularly,’ she said.
The woman, who asked not to be named, said she thought many people did not know that leaving the bottles in front of the bank would cause problems.
However, a 52-year-old man who does his recycling at Chouet, said it was unbelievable so many people had just left their bottles next to the bank.
‘That’s not recycling, it’s fly tipping,’ said the man, who also asked not to be named.
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Maybe the Govt could raise some revenue by this practice of not emptying the receptacles and then waiting behind a hedge in readiness to dish out heavy fines.
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I completely agree with the 52 year old commenter. I’d also like to add that it just demonstrates how lazy people are, afterall how hard is it to take your recycling home for another day?
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Sorry but my understanding of fly tipping is the random disposal on open land, common land or other public areas, of unwanted refuse or ‘undisposable’ items e.g. mattresses etc. Why can’t this be turned into a positive – the island seems to be full of people wanting to recycle their waste products. Where I live in the Middle East, it’s not even considered by the local population, only expat communities do it. I think it’s brilliant that there’s such a positive attitude to this in Guernsey. This is the busiest week of the year for consumption of booze – why make this into a story GP or were you all in the pub too and too distracted to look for real stories. On the downside it’s a shame the States didn’t arrange for contingencies to have the waste removed during the ‘long weekend’ over Christmas. Now there’s the story….
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I have waited days to do my recycling and whenever going past the banks I normally use I have checked whether they are still overflowing. Finally today I have been able to recycle most things. There are however always going to be a minority of people who think things don’t apply to them or are just plain lazy. Luckily we have not had any rain which would have made it worse for any paper / cardboard left lying around. What is fly tipping however is the rubbish people leave by the recycling banks which clearly can’t be recycled. For instance at the moment there is a load of plastic items just dumped by the plastic bottle bank at La Salerie. I’m not sure what it is, but it’s definitely not plastic bottles! There is no excuse for leaving that there.
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dolly
Bang on there. Took the words right out of my mouth!
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Welcome to the future
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The states should have expected this over x-mas and emptied the banks on x-mas eve, then the 27th.
Maybe even put out extra bins at the more popular recycling sites.
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In my experience the recycling centres are often full to overflowing at weekends too, which is when most people have time to do recycling. I have been told they’re emptied every day, but it doesn’t look like it. However, if this is true and we want to raise the % recycled, then surely the answer is to have bigger, or more, skips? If people are going to fly-tip then why not have an official fly tipping centre, e.g. at Longue Hougue? At least it will be all in one place and could be sorted and what can’t be recycled taken to the tip?
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I feel that if the states are serious about recycling then all sites should be equipped with facilities that automatically bail cardboard, crush glass and compact cans so that it can be simply be picked up from each drop off point.
It could then be placed into containers and shipped out with out any extra mileage and double handling or storage.
The initial cost would be quite expensive but I am sure that it would soon pay for itself in a few years.
Maybe containers with these facilities already exist. If so it would be worth considering.
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I can hardly believe that there are people prepared to defend those antisocial sluts who have just dumped their rubbish on the pavements near the recycling points. I suppose they would also defend leaving “bin bags” on the pavement days before it’s due to be collected.
Having said that, it does seem like improvidence not to have arranged for more bins or more frequent collections.
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Ted
Its supply and demand. The states demand it and we supply it. It is down to them to get their facilities in order not us.
Common sense would tell most with an ounce of
intelligence that peak times demand peak services.
If they can’t service the facilities adequately then the blame should be pointed at them. The general public are only doing what is being asked of them. None of us receive any rewards for recycling. We do it out of the goodness of social responsibility.
Start directing you anger at those that should be doing their jobs properly. Not the public who are acting responsibly for their home land!
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Another predictable cock-up. I didn’t have to dump any recycling items near any over-full bins, but I would have done had I found it necessary. The future of refuse disposal lies in recycling and the States are duty bound to provide an appropriate and sufficient service.
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Oh my god! I agree with everything Paul says!
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It doesn’t surprise me in the slightest that people were just dumping their re-cycling – let’s face it there are a lot of selfish lazy people on this island. Those who claim that they are trying to do their bit but are unable to clearly have no concept of why we actually recycle.
The States even put messages out through the media about when the banks were to be emptied and not to leave rubbish lying around!!
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Nobby
If the states had the foresight to put up messages then they should have had the same foresight to up their collections a few gears.
Now who are the selfish lazy people?
For the record, its not the responsible recyclers!
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It is both annoying and frustrating to fill ones boot up with recycling material to then find that the bins are full to brimming day after day . This did happen to me over the holiday period and having driven around the island looking for empty recycling bins i ended up taking most of my rubbish to the chouet tip myself. It cost me both in tipping charges and in petrol – which is not conducive to the environmental aspect of recycling!
I do not have a large house or a garage where i can store recycling material so had no choice as it was clogging up my kitchen. I use my boot as my recycling centre! The media reported that the bring banks were going to be emptied regularly over the holiday period and that Public Services were aware that this holiday period was going to busier than normal – but it seems the reality was that they were not. Perhaps they had a lot of staff sickness to contend with, but they could have put out more media statements. I do think there is no excuse for leaving soggy cardboard out or boxes of bottles etc – that is purely selfish and stupid, although i sympathise with the frustration of driving around in ever decreasing circles looking for a bring bank with some space.
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One minute the states are telling us that we have to recycle more and that the landfill won’t last long enough if we don’t, and then when people try to do their bit and recycle, the States moan because they can’t cope with it. It’s one or the other! Did this not happen last year? Instead of telling people not to leave bottles lying around, why not get your backsides in gear and have more collections?…
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Paul – I would hardly call people who left bottles etc out in the open responsible.
Whilst I agree it is annoying to find the bring banks full, having more collections over the holiday period would mean more cost to us, the taxpayer. You lot would then be moaning about that. Some people are never happy.
A balance has to be struck on the level of service provided and the cost. I personally think the balance was right.
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Two simple solutions I’d like to propose to this issue:
1. Get larger bins – evidently recycling is becoming more popular so larger facilities are required.
2. Have a kerbside recycling scheme….oh that’s right, they tried that one and decided to cancel it…
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Why can’t we have road side recycling like in the GTA where you have 4 bins one is for food waste, one for glass/plastic, one for paper/cardboard e.t.c and one for general rubbish?
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Nobby,
I can only assume that you live in a huge mansion where unlimited piles of rubbish can accumulate without causing you any inconvenience and that you have servants to drive around the island looking for somewhere to dump it after the christmas break, unlike the rest of us who live in modest houses without room for mountains of recycling to pile up and who have lives to get on with and children to ferry around and work to do and shopping to fetch whilst waiting for the States get their act together. For some of us, keeping mountains of recycling in our homes and/or cars is not feasible for weeks on end. Sorry if you don’t like it, but there you go. It’s called life.
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PSD and its contractors would have had to have been living under a rock not to realise that Islanders are recycling and that Christmas would be exceptional.
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I agree with Paul Le P – Get proper bins – one for rubbish and one for recycling.
In addition, the states should buy a truck that lifts the bins up and tips the rubbish or recycling into the truck automatically -just like other 1st world nations do.
We dont have plastic bags in shops anymore but everyone still uses big black plastic bags for rubbish, its just stupidity – get proper bins Guernsey!
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Are people too lazy not to take their recycling back home with them. If the bins are full when I go to recycle then the stuff stays in the boot of the car until the next time I go. I don’t understand why people have to try and ram their stuff in so the cardboard or paper is sticking out and ends up getting wet or blowing away and then it can’t be recycled. The same goes with bottles or tins why leave it on the ground? LAZY or what?!
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Indeed Julie LAZY.
And no, I don’t live in a mansion, or have servants, and I do have a family that I like to spend my time with. I also have a reasonable attitude to what recycling should be, and what OUR responsibilities are.
If you lot are so made of money that you want PSD to lay on round the clock services to empty bins at your beck and call, fine – I personally can’t really afford to pay more in tax. It just so happens that I am able to organize my life around what is available and not expect others to revovle around me.
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Either way its a lose lose.
More than one trip to the recycling and you would lose the actual environmental benefit of the recycling through the increased emissions of two or more trips in the car
OR leave the recycling there to rely on the states to put it in themselves and be labelled lazy.
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Although I find it frustrating to find the recycling bins full all too often, I side with the fly tipping opinion. It is what it is.
Is it really so hard to come back another day? We live on a small island where any recycling point is at most a half-hour round trip away. Get a grip. Take some responsibility and stop blaming the service providers.
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The States were not complaining in the article, they merely REITERATED that the public were warned before the festive period and asked not to dump waste. It is the dumper who needs to get their act together and develop some sense of responsibility! In my eyes you shouldn’t need warning, it is simple common sense that Christmas will be a particularly busy period, which makes dumping your rubbish even more ignorant and outlandish!
Fly-tipping is the unauthorised or illegal leaving of waste and therefore those too lazy to take their recycling away are fly-tippers!
Bring banks are not a manned service, they are collected by one member of staff with a lorry! Who are you to say that because the bins are full he should have to spend an hour or so of his day picking up the bottles of incompetent and ignorant ‘recyclers?’ How would you like it if somebody came to your place of work and dumped 600 bottles and cans in your way to clear before you could start to work?
It makes me wonder whether those who dumped their rubbish are ‘doing their bit’ for the environment with the belief that recycling makes them a better person? Does it help you sleep at night or in your narrow mind do you sleep well because it’s now somebody else’s problem but you’ve done something ‘good’?
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On Jan 4th, Gaz says that someone has left plastic that isn’t bottles. I am not sure what the plastic was that he saw but just thought it worth mentioning that we recycle plastics 1 & 2 here in Guernsey, and quite often those items are not bottles. Always worth checking any plastic container you have… as long as it is a 1 or 2 and is CLEAN, it can be recycled.
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As at Sunday 18th Jan there was a child’s car seat (fabric removed), what looked like a table football table, a case that could have been for a drill or similar. Together with a load of painted canvases which definitely can’t be recycled at the bring banks. Somebody had definitely just dumped those there because they were too lazy to get rid of them properly.
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YOu know encouraging restaurants to recycle is hard enough but when bins are full i dont blame them for leaving bags of separated waste.
I had to go to 4 recycling sites to get rid of my pitifully small amount of recycling last sunday…..and this sunday i went again and found bins still overflowing.
recyclers are helping the island with the problem of waste and saving the tip overflowing and hopefully lowering the cost so how dare anyone accuse people of flytipping or have a go?? yes the states should empty the bins more often and yes they make money out of it selling recycling on……….shame we dont see the3 profits passed on
if you want people to recycle esp businesses then arrange more frequent emptying of bins…..its been many weeks now since ive found room for my recycling
PULL YOUR FINGER OUT STATES!!!!!
adn stop having a go at the people who are trying to help guernseys waster problem!!!!
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