Southwark Recycling Creeping Cost Cutting

[jaywalker]

I drove to the great Southwark (well actually outsourced) recycling Cathedral off the Old Kent Road today for my fortnightly visit and feeling of being at one with nature. I do this because the property I inhabit with others would need several blue bins otherwise and they are such an eyesore.

But my faith was once again put to the test. What I thought was going to be a leaflet full of Christmas cheer turned out to be yet another exercise in Southwark cost cutting. In the future if you want to bring a van you have to book in advance. And only four trips per year.

Just as I was thinking of getting rid of my car and hiring the on-street zip vehicle for an hour - but it is a van...

Last year it was the introduction of compulsory ID before you could enter, now this.

Now I fully understand the gradgrindish rationale. Wicked people from outside the borough were freeloading on our Centre! The new rules suggest that even more wicked people from within the borough are using their home address to do some COMMERCIAL clearing without paying.

But I do find it all so very depressing. The Cathedral is nowhere near operating at full capacity, and it achieves a 100% recycling rate. I can only assume that recycling is not cost effective, so the council is paying a great subsidy to the firm responsible for it to happen at all. But if so, then why are we recycling? There could only be an argument that the negative externalities from not recycling would be greater than the subsidy. But this creates its own distortion: those benefiting from the reduction in pollution (global warming etc) are NOT the same people as those paying the subsidy. In fact, these restrictions make street dumping of rubbish more likely.

This seems to me an obvious case for nationalisation. These plants should be available free for all, the subsidy paid (and justified) by central government.