What a waste of compost!

It's amazing how our council have generated so much bad will over something that no-one was unhappy with before. I fully agree with them that steps need to be taken to reduce household waste, but I believe that they have their sums wrong. Most households with 4 adults in it will require more than 1.5 bags of household waste a week, especially as we seem to be able to recycle less and less. But then, maybe before we were deluding ourselves about how much we recycled. It's not really recycling if it just gets sorted and thrown away at the other end.

Where we really seem to have missed the point is in charging £60 a year for a company to take our green waste from us. Firstly, why is it £60 for us, and only £30 in Bracknell? And secondly, how is it fair that someone with a 30 foot back garden pays the same for green waste as someone with half an acre? This goes against the principle that those with the deepest pockets pay the most.

So, what would a Co-operative approach be to this problem? I compost what I can, it's my green waste and I get the benefit of the compost from it. I don't burn fuel taking it to another town and gain no benefit. But I appreciate that we can not all do that. I wonder if there is scope for co-operative run micro-compost centres across the borough? We have been warned that the changes being introduced will increase the fly tipping of green waste. How about making provision for green waste to be taken locally, composted and given back to the people that provide it and maintain it.

Cameron's plans for the Big Society were much derided for being ill thought out and poorly explained, but maybe this is a case where it could work. Community led composting, maybe on a ward by ward basis, with the local community benefiting could really work. And it wouldn't be all about the end product. I wouldn't mind betting that there are retired couples across the borough where one partner would welcome the other getting out from under their feet for a few hours a week to spend some time helping out at the compost centres.

What do people think?