PAPER, bottles and plastic that millions of householders are being forced to recycle are routinely being dumped in landfill sites.

Recycling companies say they are receiving tens of thousands of tons of materials from councils which are so contaminated or badly sorted that they have to be rejected or dumped.

Many councils are cutting corners to meet targets for recycling up to 40% of their residents’ waste by 2010. Instead of being properly separated, the waste is poorly sorted and sent to specialist recycling companies that cannot then reprocess it.

Dick Searle, chief executive of the Packaging Federation, said: “The recycling infrastructure in this country is disgraceful. We’ve got a situation where the collection methods – particularly where householders are being told to chuck everything [paper, cans and plastic] in together – means we are now seriously in danger of recycling going backwards.”

The Sunday Times investigation found that:

- A paper recycling company in Kent is sending to landfill 9,000 tons a year of cans, bottles and plastics. These have been mixed up with the paper and the firm does not have the capability to process them.

- Britain’s biggest glass recycling company is sending tons of glass to roadfill because it is so contaminated.

- A Warrington-based aluminium processor, regarded as a world leader in its field, is regularly rejecting British waste because it is so poorly sorted and is importing used cans from abroad.

- Container loads of mixed recyclable materials rejected by British companies are unlawfully shipped abroad to be sorted in China, India and Indonesia.

Recycling in the UK has enjoyed a boom in recent years, but faced with government demands to increase recycling further, councils are increasingly resorting to “co-mingled” collections, whereby householders mix plastics, paper, glass and cans. It is claimed that their sorting depots are often overwhelmed and the materials are not properly sorted.

Chris White, commercial manager at the Kent-based company Aylesford Newsprint, which recycles paper, said: “I want paper. I’m paying for paper. But we get plastic bags, plastic bottles, some cans and textiles. I can’t find an outlet for it and it goes for landfill.”

David Workman, director-general of British Glass, a trade association, said the industry was being forced to send back bottles and waste, which was then used as aggregate in roads or sent for landfill. “It’s frustrating,” he said, “because recycling glass into new bottles and jars is the most environmentally friendly thing you can do with it.”

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