A number of people suggest using the bags as kitchen bin liners, for picking up after your dog, or for similar uses. Photo / Joel Ford
City bins for reusables not the place for grocery or bread holders.
Where are we supposed to recycle plastic bags, such as supermarket shopping bags and bread bags? The Grey Lynn Countdown supermarket used to have a plastic recycling station but it disappeared with their last refit, and a worker there told me the bags were shipped to China, where they were
often burnt anyway. I always try to avoid plastic bags but it's inevitable you end up with some and fairly soon it's a massive pile. Help! Richard Wain, Grey Lynn.
This is a knotty one. The Auckland City website advises that plastic bags are not permitted in recycling bins, as they can clog the machines at the recycling facility and cause machinery failures. Fair enough. Don't put individual empty plastic bags in the bin, or even great clumps of them.
But even after thorough searches of websites, I can find nothing that suggests you may not put plastic bags in your rubbish (either bag or red-top bin, depending on your area) if they contain items that are acceptable in that type of bin or bag. A number of people suggest using the bags as kitchen bin liners, for picking up after your dog, or for similar uses, before putting the bags out for your normal collection.
They can also be used as packaging for delicate items to be posted, or donated to charity shops, or given to local preschools, which apparently go through heaps.
