IT’S TIME Oxfordshire local authorities cleaned up their act where recycling is concerned.

Reports from the Friends of the Earth have said that nearly £3-4bn is wasted in rare materials like steel, rubber, wheat and rare earth metals being sent to landfill sites instead of being recycled, such that it is costing industry in the UK hundreds of millions of pounds to import these materials for processing into their production items. Cherwell District Council has announced new recycling measures for glass and plastic.

The whole recycling scenario is a sham by local authorities to shift responsibility onto private collection companies as I suggested in my letter (Viewpoints, August 13, Rubbish way to recycle).

These companies are only interested in making huge profits from local authorities who are too inefficient to organise proper and environmentally beneficial collections and recycling methods. Hence the collection contractors don’t care about the environment and over 26 per cent of recycled materials get landfilled.

Adrian Taylor

Thames Court

Eynsham