Boris Bungles Plan to Reward Recycling

Boris Johnson’s eye-catching plan to reward Londoners who recycle certainly wouldn’t work in Camden as most of our households live in multiple occupation properties. Incentivising or penalising those who do or don’t recycle only works if you can associate households with their bins. We can’t. Back to the drawing board, Boris.

A much better way to incentivise residents to both reduce waste and recycle more would be to copy Belgium. There councils sell colour-coded, bar-coded bags to local shops. Bags for residual waste cost the most. Bags for aluminium cans and plastic bottles – the most valuable type of recycling - cost the least. The cost of waste collection and disposal can then be removed from local taxes. That’s the sort of radical but practical idea that might work.