From the country that brought you 'bring out your dead...'

You have to admire the official optimism of some town hall policy wonks..

Manchester: Bring in bins to stop fire starters

'Entertain your kids. Impress your friends! A bin in the hall is a sure sign that you have the health of our balance sheet well up on the agenda, and the heck with smell or hygiene or space!'

Bless.

It's academic... apparently. Still

Close the loop on plastic, says leading academic

Couldn't agree more with Dr. Thompson. Though why it is an academic issue... still... now... rather defeats me.

But then, I'm only a consumer.

And that, 'scuse the pun, seems to make me just... fine.

Made me smile. Then frown.

This from the ever-useful MRW: Councils' decisions questioned by Repic letter

At first blush it looks like little in our consumer sphere to get involved with, but then I decided to have a nosey.

Considering the amounts involved, how such decisions are arrived at should be of massive public interest, and especially when they affect how we set up the planet of the future. For our kids? Or targets and/or bonuses?

Councils may 'have expressed concern about this letter'. I'd like to know why. And what the answers are.

This - “Local authorities may deem the information requested as commercially sensitive and decide not to give it out.” is one hell of a get out (of jail free?)!

Spinning is tops

A report on something I was present at, and had a rather different take upon.

WI flexes muscles over excess packaging

I was there when this speech was made, and examples of 'gratuitous packaging' were paraded, which lead to the now infamous 'Banana Metaphor'.

Because, in the spirit of my own education and informing the public, I asked why a cited pack of bananas was indeed so wastefully wrapped in plastic. It seemed odd to go to the expense of doing so if it was not necessary.

Considering that meetings had been held with everyone from Gordon Brown to Terry Leahy by the WI, I was a little perturbed that despite the leap to high-profile criticism, no one seemed to have tried to find out why, or derived a satisfactory answer.

Those my question generated from the floor ranged from protection from organic rotting gases to preventing food waste from singletons dropping from hands and being deemed consumer unacceptable. Both potentially environmentally sound, if true, I’d hazard, but I am still unsure as the very industry that handles this seemed to have differing explanations in justification.

One statistic, also needing confirmation, that did strike me was that food waste represents 95% of total vs. 5% from packaging, and hence one wonders why more effort should not be devoted to reducing this first?