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My Background My interest in recycling evolved from
common-sense advice not to litter from
my primary school headmaster in the 1960's.
Back then recycling was not dominated to the
same extent by big business.
Charities would collect rags or bottles to
raise money for their projects.
There were deposits on coke and milk bottles,
poor people or children would take back their
empties to the milk bar or supermarket, they would
also collect bottles at football matches
and roadsides for a little pocket money.
Beer drinkers would save their bottles at home
and cash them in with a "bottleo" who would
collect them.
Regrettably deposits on beverage containers do
not exist in Australia,except for South Australia
where there is a 5 cent deposit on all beverage
containers.
South Australia's roads are a lot cleaner as a result.
I used to volunteer at my local Police amd Citizens Youth
Club where they had about 50 oil drums for glass which would be smashed on site and then delivered to the Australian Glass Manufacturer for sale.
More recently I have been campaigning for full kerbside collections of beverage containers,most Tasmanian municipalities have full kerbside but Launceston only has a paper collection.
There is a petition currently circulating,the Recycling Action Group aims to collect 1000 signatures before presenting to the Launceston City Council as they will then
call a public meeting to discuss the issue.
I am also trying to get a public place recycling network in Launceston,recently an effective network of recycling centres was closed down after operating in the city for over 20 years,for about 6 months I had operated Launceston's only recycling station,unfortunately this too has closed by order of the lAUNCESTON CITY COUNCIL.
Basically it grew too big and was too successful for our
civic leaders to handle.
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