Press release - Council up for national green award

Ellesmere Port and Neston Borough Council has been nominated for a prestigious national recycling award.

The borough is up for Best Local Authority Project in the Valpak Awards 2006, which aims to reward the best recycling and waste cutting programmes in the UK last year.

Since the council launched its fortnightly kerbside collection of recyclables in May 2005 the amount of waste being reprocessed by residents has leapt from 7.5% to 40%.

This is one of the top rates in the UK and 16% higher than the Government’s statutory target for that year.

Waste Manager Ian Mealor said the council was delighted to be in the running for one of the awards’ five categories.

“It’s a major achievement to be shortlisted for such a prestigious national award and all should be congratulated, including residents, councillors and staff,” he said.

“Everyone associated with the new initiative has worked very hard to ensure it was successful, but it’s been the enthusiasm shown by residents that has made our recycling performance among the best in the country.”

The kerbside scheme was introduced to 7,000 residents in September 2003 and in a survey 90% said they were delighted with the service.

Running the pilot allowed the council to take on board householders’ comments and tweak the scheme before it was rolled out through the borough in May last year.

With the help of an ongoing communications campaign spearheaded by cartoon superhero RITA! (Recycling is the Answer!) householders were encouraged to sort their glass, paper, cardboard, plastics, polythene, textiles, tins and garden waste into colour-coded boxes, bags and bins.

The recycling vehicles, boxes and all related literature were branded with RITA! and a specially-designed vehicle called Little RITA! collects recycling in rural and hard to reach areas.

Thirty extra staff were trained to carry out the collections and a Recycling Helpline set up to answer residents’ queries took 81,962 calls in its first year of operation.

Recycling now alternates fortnightly with general rubbish collections and residents have been given tips on ways to store waste safely.

Around 35,000 properties in the borough’s urban and rural areas, including flats, can now recycle through the kerbside scheme or at recycling banks.

The council also opened a dedicated Material Recycling Facility with a magnetic aluminium/steel can separator and a steel crusher, which makes recycling far more cost effective.

The borough will find out if it has been successful when Valpak announces the winners at an awards ceremony in London on September 21.  

END

Press release issued September 4th 2006