All Caerau residents urged to embrace recycling

All members of the Caerau community are being urged to help keep their own streets cleaner by embracing the benefits of recycling.

While a large number of Caerau residents are already going green by recycling as much as they can and keeping to Bridgend County Borough Council’s limit of only two bin bags per fortnight, some residents have been slower to change their habits.

Unfortunately it has become a frequent sight to see bin bags piled high on street corners or dumped in communal areas, as a minority of residents aren’t making the most of their recycling opportunities to reduce the amount of refuse they’re throwing out.

The anti-social behaviour is frustrating for those residents who have pride in their community, and Bridgend County Borough Council is determined to improve the situation.

Starting this week, council workers have been knocking on doors in Caerau to meet with residents, discuss the benefits of recycling, and explain what can and can’t be recycled.

More than 250 homes have already been visited in Caerau Road, Hamilton Terrace and Treharne Road, while residents in the town’s remaining 750 homes will be also be visited during the next couple of months.

We brought in our new recycling and waste arrangements in the summer of 2017 in response to the Welsh Government’s ambitions to make Wales the world’s number one country for recycling. Because the Welsh Government recognises that our planet cannot continue to cope with the amount of rubbish we are throwing away, burning or putting back into the earth, they have set new targets of 64 per cent in 2019-20, and 70 per cent in 2024-25 for how much household waste needs to be recycled.

Thanks to the way that the majority of residents have embraced recycling and our two bin bag rule, we are well on track to achieving those new recycling targets. However, we’re aware that there are some pockets of communities, including Caerau, where residents could be recycling more. Recycling is here to stay, so it’s something that all residents need to accept and adapt to. The old days of throwing everything into a bin bag and not giving a second thought to recycling are long gone. All local authorities in Wales are having to up their game when it comes to recycling, and we need each and every resident to take responsibility.

Rather than being heavy handed, we think the best approach is education so we want to meet as many Caerau residents as possible to talk to them about recycling. We want to do everything we can to help them. If they aren’t sure what can be recycled in each container, or perhaps aren’t aware of our separate collections for nappies, we want to give them as much information as possible. We want to clean up Caerau, but we need all local residents to do their bit.

Councillor Hywel Williams, Bridgend County Borough Council’s Deputy Leader

To find out more about recycling in Bridgend County Borough, please visit the Recycle for Bridgend website.