Purple bins for paper and card coming to West Lindsey next year

Purple bins for separate paper and card bin collections in West Lindsey has been ‘unanimously’ backed by councillors as part of a new recycling initiative.

The proposals were agreed during a council meeting on November 2, opting to introduce a twin stream recycling collection service in areas which receive a wheeled bin collection starting Spring 2022.

West Lindsey District Council will become the third Lincolnshire authority to introduce the new scheme, following Boston Borough Council and North Kesteven District Council.

Much like the other two councils, the bin will be purple-lidded and accept dry paper and cardboard only, with other recyclable items going into the recycling bin.

The purple bins will be collected in the alternate fortnight, with the current blue recycling bin being collected monthly, though there are no current plans to change collection days.

The scheme has been successful elsewhere in the county following trials over the last 12 months, and it is expected to be fully rolled out across Lincolnshire by 2024.

North Kesteven District Council has reported successful collection rates of 98 and 99% in its two collections of the purple bins so far, while trials in Boston were 95% successful.

It is as yet unclear if the dry paper and card collections will take place in areas where sack collections are in place instead of bins, such as the South West Ward of Gainsborough.

Vice Chairman of the Prosperous Communities Committee, Cllr Tracey Coulson who is also chair of the Environmental Working Group at WLDC, said: “With COP26 taking place in Glasgow over the next two weeks, climate change and environmental issues are at the forefront of people’s thinking.

“Figures show that our current co-mingled collections are seeing more contamination and there is also a reduction in the quality of material that is recycled which means we need to act now to improve this.

“Our neighbouring authorities who have trialled the new system are already reporting that a better quality of material is being produced in both the blue and purple lidded bins.

“It is not increasing carbon footprint by separating materials to gain a more reusable and valuable resource. It also means we are able to achieve national targets for recycling by reducing the contamination and increasing the quantity of material that can be recycled.”