South Tyneside households could get extra bin after success of recycling trial

Earlier this year, South Tyneside Council trialled a new way of working for household recycling collections.

Since February, around 1,500 properties in the village have had access to two blue bins each to help separate materials.

Following a recent review, the pilot has been credited for helping to boost recycling rates in the area.

Now, town hall chiefs have hinted that the scheme could be rolled out to other areas in the borough.

“Some of the feedback we have had from residents around our recycling services, particularly when you have a lot of deliveries from Amazon and the Post Office, is that they’re building up more and more cardboard,” said corporate lead for area management on the council, Andrew Whittaker.

“As a consequence of that and working with one of our contractors we now have a ‘two-bin service’, you put your bottles and cans in one bin and cardboard and paper in the other.

“We have had some early results in and it has been really really positive with residents in terms of the extra recycling that they can commit to.

“What we have seen is an 8% rise in recycling in that particular area and believe it or not, a reduced cost to the local authority by doing it which is fantastic.

“We’re not going to roll it out just yet, some of the issues that we have around the service are facilitating the other bin, so instead of having three it would be four.”

Mr Whittaker was speaking at a meeting of the Jarrow and Boldon Community Area Forum earlier this month.

In response to a question from a member of the public, he said that any borough-wide roll out would require public consultation.

This includes potential issues around extra bins being presented on the pavement on collection day.

A review of the Whitburn recycling trial in October highlighted positive responses from residents and waste crews alongside lower levels of contamination.

However, it has not yet been decided which parts of the borough the trial will be expanded to.