Donald Wilson's blue bin gurn

This in from local resident Donald Wilson:

Local council operatives flexing their muscle today. Refused to uplift my binful of plastics, tins cardboard etc. Put a sticker on my blue bin for an offending couple of plastic supermarket bags I had placed at the top of the load containing piles of other plastic and cardboard material. For 'contaminating' the load with two plastic supermarket size bags my penalty is now it won't be emptied until December 31. Now that's clever. What the h*** do you do with accumulative waste over Christmas.

By the way - I was considering being a good citizen and taking a shovel to clear the mess of debris including food waste in the car park behind Barron House once rented by the council. If we wait long enough the rats are going to move in and it'll cost the council a lot more to clean that little lot up. I'll leave them to it! No doubt they will argue it's private property and run up a legal bill costing the taxpayer hundreds to get it cleaned up.

Little wonder people shake their heads at the jobsworths running the country. I know everyone is subject to the same rules. But a simple sticker reminding me about my responsibilities re plastic bags would have sufficed. So much for the season of goodwill.

Donald Wilson

Blue bin debate hits the local mainstream media

Recently this observer heard from one Fishertown resident who told us that he had been to the council to refuse a blue bin on the grounds that he had nowhere to put it and that he was willing to continue to make regular trips up the road to the recycling centre. We also know one other Fishertown resident who has to traipse bins through the house from the rear garden on collection days, if she put them outside then pedestrians would have to walk on the road. So not everywhere can accommodate a range of bins easily especially some parts of the Fishertown. There has been quite a bit of debate recently on the Gurn on the merits or otherwise of the blue bins but now the argument has exploded onto the pages of the Nairnshire Telegraph with an intervention from Fishertown resident Audrey Young who suggests in a a hard-hitting letter that they should be removed. More in your weekly paper.

Could "Nairnshire Waste Busters" get off the ground?

Tommy Hogg told last night's meeting of River CC that he had been approached by Graham Vine of West CC about the possibilty of setting up a copy of the successful Moray Waste Busters operation in Nairn.
The idea received strong backing from Tommy's fellow community councillors and he is to go through to Forres with Graham on an official visit to Waste Busters. Liz revealed that the town's four Highland Councillors had received an e-mail from an individual along the same lines seeking their backing to set-up such an operation. Liz said she would put the individual concerned in touch with Tommy and Graham.
Graham Marsden suggested that there was certainly space up at Balmakeith for such an operation with the bonus that everything that would be recycled would not go to landfill which costs money.

It was felt at the meeting that this idea would be an ideal item to add to the agenda of the first meeting of the Combined Community Council Forum. We could certainly do with such a facility in Nairn and I'm sure Gurnites will add their support to Tommy and Graham's proposal, in the meantime anyone looking for a bargain might want to visit the Moray Waste busters facilities. There's no shortage of recycled goods and objects there at bargain prices and this observer was particularly struck by the large amount of golf clubs that were available.

The Blue Bins are arriving

Good to see the shiny new blue bins appearing in Nairn. Here's looking forward to more recylcing. A pity glass still has to be taken to central points however.

Brave New Renewable World

Personally I'm glad some effort is finally going into renewables but a lot more has to be done if humanity is to get away from coal-fired or nuclear generation. Bearing this in mind the following comment by anemophobe is perhaps worth an airing as a post in its own right:

"The recent gale force winds led to news headlines about power-cuts in and around Inverness and elsewhere in Scotland.

Which set me thinking, in this region of ever-more numerous windfarms. Back in the fierce grip of sub-zero winter with deep snow on the ground, frost on the trees and a massive increase in demand for power for heating, did the wind turbines deliver? Not a lot: the blades hung motionless in the still and freezing air.

Then this week: howling winds, so no doubt the turbines were spinning flat out and the windfarms were generating immense quantities of electricity. And what happened? What an irony: in the heart of windfarm country, thousands of households, shops and factories across the region suddenly found they were getting no power at all.

O brave new natural, renewable world!"

Recycling fines proposal gets more publicity

Highland Council's proposal for fines for folk that don't recycle gets aired in the Hearald today.

"ONE of Scotland’s largest local authorities has called on the Government to introduce on- the-spot fines of £60 to residents who do not recycle.

Highland Council wants households who throw out cardboard, newspapers, plastic bottles and glass and those who contaminate recycling bins with food waste and other items such as soiled nappies to be fined."

Errr, hold on can we have something to put the plastic and cardboard in first please? We've gurned about this before actually. More in the Herald.

More recycling facilities needed in Nairn town centre

Recently this observer visited two small towns in the North of England (Settle and Appelby). It was astonishing to compare the poverty of our town centre recycling facilities with those available in those two small communities

From July next year the weekly collection will cease and we will have a fortnightly lift of our green bins. A report in the Courier has attracted a swarm of hostile comments. It may be easier for Nairnites if we could take a few more items down to a town centre recyling centre (eg plastic and cartons) instead of burning carbon and destroying the environment by driving out to the centre on the Grantown Road. If we could do as they are well trained to do in Settle and Appleby and deposit our recycling on normal trips to the town centre then, along with the use of brown vegetable/garden waste bins then perhaps we might only need a once a month service. We believe that Highland Council are trying to get away with providing an inferior service without offering sensible alternatives to the population. Settle town centre car park and the opportunity to recycle plastic

Now you can recycle batteries in Nairn

Now at last you don't have to wait until you go to a neighbouring town to recycle batteries. The co-op will accept them from you. Today Britain comes into line with the rest of Europe and retailers have to have collection points. Just hand your used batteries in at the co-op counter.