Recycle for Kenilworth is calling on local residents, schools, and businesses to hold mini-litterpicks and report the biggest littering concern near them during Great Big Green Week, the UK's biggest celebration of action on climate which runs until Sunday 15 June.

In partnership with charity The Kenilworth Centre, the campaign has organised a Group Litter Pick at the Kenilworth Lions Grand Show this coming Saturday, and will audit the litter picked to report back to Surfers Against Sewage Plastic Free Communities.

Recycle for Kenilworth co-ordinator, former pharmacist May Lau, encourages everyone to take clean plastic packaging and plastic bags, bottles, cans and other non-organic waste home and put it in their blue-lidded recycling bin, since Warwick District Council now sends kerbside collections to state-of-the-art waste management facility Sherbourne Recycling Centre in Coventry.

And May, who has been collecting hard-to-recycle plastics from residents since April 2022, appeals to councils around the country to follow the Kenilworth model to drive up recycling awareness.

"It has to be the council adopting the work of the community around them and recognising the importance of voluntary community work. It isn't sustainable just with community working alone," she said.

"I wanted evidence-based recycling justice - to enable everyone in Kenilworth to recycle. I welcome other groups to get in touch with me to discuss what approach we took".

May set up Recycle for Kenilworth out of frustration that, at the time, only those with a car could recycle items like plastic bags and plastic film by taking them to drop-offs at big out-of-town supermarkets. Simultaneously, her daughter at university in Belfast was reporting difficulties finding places to take recycling to.

Recycle for Kenilworth ran litter-picks and monthly 'sorting parties' to separate out piles of recyclable materials, attracting around 10 volunteers per session and generating "a sense of enjoyment, achievement and satisfaction," May says.

Group representing Kenilworth community, Kenilworth Town and Warwick District Council visit to Sherbourne Recycling Centre in May 2024

Items needing specialist processing such as toothpaste tubes, bread bags and dishwasher detergent packaging were sent to recycling and reuse platform TerraCycle and other recycling initiatives, bringing in a small amount of funds for The Kenilworth Centre's youth mental health and wellbeing programmes.

May's initiative won support from Kenilworth town council members, including current Mayor of Kenilworth Cllr James Kennedy, a "compulsive litter picker" who continues to volunteer for the group.

Then last October, Warwick District Council became the first in the county to offer kerbside collections of hard-to-recycle plastics such as plastic film, plastic bags and bubble wrap, explaining to residents that this can go with all other recycling into one blue-lidded bin.

The mixed recycling is taken to Sherbourne Resource Park, where it is separated using an AI-powered process and sent to 'offtakers' – UK firms which re-use and redevelop the material. For example, plastic bags and wrappings might be used to make bin bags.

Warwick District Council's move to kerbside collections of flexible plastics is part of a wider £2.9 million FlexConnect project involving innovative recycling pilots at ten local authorities around the country.

This year, other West Midlands local authorities in the consortium of eight which owns Sherborne have announced the start of flexible plastics kerbside collections – Solihull in March and Stratford-on-Avon district council in April.

Recycle for Kenilworth supporter Lisa says, "I have thought it such a waste to throw all the plastic packaging in the grey bin. I was so happy to learn that you collect these plastics to recycle and make money for The Kenilworth Centre". Kenilworth resident Elizabeth says of the town's move to send recycling to the Sherborne Centre: "My husband couldn't believe what he heard on the news… Nearly everything goes in the recycling bin now."

May says: "We now have such great recycling collection services from Warwick District Council we can minimise littering while maximising recycling. By removing litter and recycling appropriately, we protect our environment and lessen impacts.

"Through timely reporting, littering concerns may be addressed in many positive ways, including behaviour change". 

She pays tribute to "giant of recycling" Kenilworth Lions Club – based on a furniture reuse/recycling store, and which is also a hub for recycling spectacles and hearing aids. "Their generous support to other groups has enabled all the community to come together to continue our recycling journey with the councils," she says.

Meanwhile following campaigning by Plastic Free Kenilworth, twelve local independent businesses have become plastic-free, leading to Kenilworth being recognised as a plastic-free community last autumn. Plastic Free Kenilworth is also joining in litter picks during Great Big Green Week.

Diana Browne, a volunteer with Plastic Free Kenilworth and member of Recycle for Kenilworth who co-founded a litter picking group, said: "It's wonderful that so many people have come together, probably through a variety of reasons, all of them being absolutely exasperated by excessive litter, waste and use of plastics.

"We've met through different groups and found we have very, very similar values and share common goals".

"We do things separately and we do things together, and we achieve great things."