epolitix had this little excerpt today:
The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs publishes guidance for councils on how to tackle fly-tipping by householders. “Councils have tended to concentrate on clearance. That is vital, but there needs to be more emphasis on preventing fly-tipping happening in the first place,” said environment minister Ben Bradshaw. “Prevention, coupled with coming down hard on those who are caught fly-tipping, could help reduce the problem and save money.”
Ah Ben Bradshaw - “coming down hard” what nonsense! Really - will we never get away from this obsession with punishment? oh yes you mention prevention - and how? that”s what you want to focus on my friend - forget the punishment. the reason people fly-tip is very simple: what else are you going to do? Especially if you haven”t a car in london and you know if you leave stuff “outside” someone”s gonna come and get it. in the absence of formal exchange/re-use mechanisms that are actually convenient, what the hell is anyone actually meant to do, for goodness sake? If there are freecylce type schemes or Re-use type schemes in the Borough that Councils actually supported instead of leaving for the voluntary sector to deal with - we may get actually somewhere. If Councils were really bothered, they”d have worked this out by now. So take for example the disgraceful state of re-use and recycling in Southwark - right on the GLA and Ken”s doorstep. Alongside the few recycling bins there was a textile/materials recycling thingie - it got full pretty quick,
( obviously in demand) so what do the Council do - provide some more textile bins? Nope - just take the existing one away. Very smart.
And this is how the Capital is going to hit its recycling targets? It seems ( and i”ve found this out through my work with local authorities) that basically because the whole business of recycling is so difficult for them to work out ( something to do with supply chain logistics - hmmph) and expensive, it turns out its cheaper for them to miss their targets. Right. Wonderful.
Amsterdam has the most amazing trash. Really awesome dude! We’ve furnished whole squats with trash including computers, hi-fi and lamps for the grow room. I once found a whole black bag full of weed just before Christmas and we all had enough space cake from it to see the new year in with a trip on the couch. We also have containers for paper, glass etc on nearly every corner now. Slowly I realise what a civilised city I live in.
Really awesome!
oh my Gawd - a bag full of weed! shit i wish that would happen to me here in London. Amsterdam sounds like a fab place indeed - i think you should be authoring the next City Guide!
now London’s pretty full of trash as well - for anyone actually able to lift things left by the wayside and transport them somewhere else - it must be heaven!
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