Campaigns

Become a Golden Supporter

Birmingham City Council has a poor recycling record when compared with other councils in the UK and abroad - Birmingham recently came 286th place in a UK recycling performance league table. Not only is this bad for the environment, but it affects Birmingham's reputation, and means we lose out on jobs.

So why doesn't the City Council just increase recycling, generating jobs and saving money? Birmingham collects 450,000 tonnes of domestic waste each year, but has signed a contract to deliver most of it to Tyseley Waste Disposal Ltd. (TWD), company running Tyseley energy-from-waste plant (incinerator). This means it is burnt or buried rather than recycled. Government inspectors have severely criticised the cost to the city.

• Recycling plastic saves energy and reduces pollution.
• There are well over 200 plastic recycling schemes in the UK.
• Recycled plastic can be made into everything from fleeces to benches!
• More than half the local authorities in the UK have plastic recycling schemes. If they can do it, why can't we?

More incineration
Incinerators are costly, polluting and discourage recycling. No-one wants a new incinerator in the city. In Kidderminster 1 in 3 people have signed a petition against a proposed new incinerator.

Clean doorstep recycling
Recyclable materials such as paper, glass, cans, plastics, clothes etc. are collected separately from other waste, normally in a plastic box put out on "bin day". They are sorted on the spot, resulting in clean, valuable, materials and more, clean, jobs. These schemes are flexible and can easily be extended to collect new materials.

What needs to be done?
Birmingham needs a proper doorstep-sorted recycling scheme.

Write to your Councilor, asking them to

• Re-negotiate the contract with TWD (the incinerator company)
• Start a weekly clean doorstep recycling collection, for multiple materials including plastic bottles.
• Set up an information scheme to help people in Birmingham reduce and recycle their waste - probably the most cost effective action the City Council could take.

You might want to put your 'Message in a Plastic Bottle' (we checked with the post office and it's fine by them) and stick your councilor's address on the outside. Ask them to recycle the bottle - after all, half the councils in the UK do, so it can't be too hard...

Briefings and other documents

• Friends of the Earth's Response to Review and Update of Birmingham City Council Waste Management Strategy
• Download a printable leaflet version of this page in doc (30k) or rtf (130k) format. (5th Apr 2002)
• Download a printable message to send to Cllr Sir Albert Bore (Leader of Birmingham City Council) or your own councillor doc (20k) or rtf (5k) format (5th April 2002).
• Friends of the Earth's Plastics Recycling Factsheet
• Recoup list of products made from recycled plastic
• Recoup UK Plastic Recycling Survery Report 2002
• Recoup briefing 'Recycling Plastic Bottles - The Energy Equation'

Waste campaign press releases 2002-4

• City urged to lose waste on Environment Day (4th June 2004)
• City recycling appeal up in smoke (9th May 2003)
• Library carrier bags get right up our noses (20th May 2002)
• Message in a bottle - Birmingham demands better recycling (20th April 2002)
• Red light for Broad Street in Green Beer and Bottle Test (11th March 2002)

Press centre: an archive of Birmingham Friends of the Earth press releases 2000-present

Action Briefing articles 2003-6

• Birmingham's Battery Amnesty (Jan-Feb 2006)
• Waste Strategy 2000: Waste not, want not (Jan-Feb 2006)
• Waste no time: Waste and the planning system (Dec 2005 - Jan 2006)
• We are (nearly) all recycling guinea pigs now (Oct-Nov 2005)
• The Ups and Downs of Recycling in Birmingham (Aug-Sept 2005)
• Are you a recycling guinea pig? (Jun-Jul 2005)
• An exhibition of creative recycling (Feb-Mar 2005)
• Plastics recycling: why shouldn't we? (Oct-Nov 2004)
• Trash and Burn: Birmingham's Waste Management Strategy (Aug-Sept 2004)
• Rubbish Response! (Aug-Sept 2004)
• 'Don't burn our rubbish!' (June-July 2004)
• Don't burn our rubbish, recycle it! (Apr-May 2004)
• National campaigners coming to the West Midlands (Feb-Mar 2004)
• Waste in the Regions (Feb-Mar 2004)
• Shropshire's Waste Plan falls into the trap (Dec 2003-Jan 2004)
• Recycling in Telford (Dec 2003-Jan 2004)
• Waste update (Oct-Nov 2003)
• Incinerators: will they never learn? (Aug-Sept 2003)
• Recycling goes up. . . in smoke (Jun-Jul 2003)
• Happiest days of our lives? (Jun-Jul 2003)
• Hereford and Worcester's ‘Resource Management’ agenda (Apr-May 2003)
• One example of lobbying on recycling (Feb-Mar 2003)

More Action Briefing articles in our archive.

This page last updated: 16th February 2006