The way I see it is that if there is a further charge for the collection of rubbish they more and more people are going to be incinerating their waste (plastics, cardboard, timber and packaging) in their gardens, thus adding to Global Warming.

Had councils got their backsides in gear and built a series of fluid-bed incinerators along with steam turbines to generate electricity, thee wouldn't be the call to penalise the general public again.

Dave Hart, Watford, Herts

I look forward to negotiating even more fly tipped household rubbish on the streets of my already decaying town once these charges come into force. Still at least my council tax can be put to good use collecting it, errr, hang on, no that's not right...

Mark, Sutton, England

i think the scheme is a good idea.it will make people think about what we are doing about rubbish.people will be up in arms at the begining but if ther is an incentive it will be accepted

william bretherton, bolton, england

Another kick in the teeth for young families.

All my kids nappies will be thrown in the street if they bring this in. And don't tell me to use towelling nappies. A recent study has confirmed the energy to produce and clean them is greater than producing and disposing of disposables.

Have kids - pay nappy tax.

This is a step too far and will be scrapped when people are spreading their rubbish around the neighbourhood to avoid paying another tax.

Lastly - tax the businesses that overpackage constantly or use unrecyclable plastics. Oh but same said businesses are the paymasters aren't they.

Si, Reading,

I vote to elect a goverment that think through all the possible issues, risks and benefits. Above all else I vote to elect someone that will deliver!

Clearly on this issue - there are lots of benefits, most people recognise them.

As a goverment thart need to act with "laser focus " on addressing this issue.

km, olney,

I have just returned fron New Zealand where some places have abandoned rubbish collection altogether. One takes ones rubbish to the local recyling place where a charge is levied according to weight.
Where I stayed, the owners said this had resulted in a big reduction in waste (virtually no fly tipping) and cheaper bills. The recyling company were collecting/storing rubbish even though there was no market in the event that a market developes. It was even claimed that they employ more litter sorters than they did before with rubbich collections.

If NZ can do it, whats the problem for us? None as far as I can see

Eric Cooper, Milton Keynes, UK

In Japanese cities the rubbish is collected every day. The citizens are asked to separate out their rubbish each day ready for collection. Everything is clearly marked with a recycling symbol, to make sure the customer knows what is what. It cost them nothing for collection.

How? Well the rubbish collection is put out to tender. Private companies bid for the pleasure of collecting your rubbish. They actually pay the Municipality. They then, in turn, made their profit from the recycling of plastics, glass, paper etc.

Why is the same system not possible in this country? It would ease some of the burden on the council tax payer and help to keep the streets cleaner.

Where there is muck there is money and the councils should, perhaps, be cashing in.

Christine Melsom Isitfair, Headley, Hampshire, UK

out of curiousity, how much will our european friends be paying towards this 'european' tax, or will the english be paying for our new 'friends' rubbish collection as well???

jb66, derby,

I really really hope this is remembered when Gordon Brown finally has the testicular fortitude to call a General Election, this country is sick of being taxed to the hilt and seeing no benefit!

Council tax is supposed to cover refuse disposal so we are in fact paying twice for the same thing.

Rob, Wallasey,

I certainly wouldn't fly-tip, however I am likely to be found at large DIY stores, cutting through layers of unecessary packaging that we do not want or need and leaving it for the store to dispose of.

Lorraine Gearing, Huddersfield, UK

I do recycle. I also pay council tax through the nose. One of the things the council tax is supposed to fund is refuse collection - why should we pay twice for the same service? If "pay as you throw" comes in will there be a commensurate reduction in the Council tax? I doubt it.

HG, swindon, Wilts

Why should families who produce a lot of waste be penalised when it is the number of people in the home that causes the volume of rubbish and NOT their inability to effectively recycle? This is another tax on hard-working people who already pay a fortune for Council Tax which is supposed to cover this sort of thing already.

Natalie Christie, London,

These proposals are a Fly-tipper's Charter. Disasterous.

Bernard, London, Gtr London

The leaders of the once great empire do not change their spots,for centuries the brits have stole at gun point the worlds riches, in my view the visit of the saudi royals is good for business and johnny come latelys to the morale high ground should check their bar code.On humans rights its a meeting of equals as britain has skeltons in its own cuboards.Woman rights, is relative, woman in the west are treated as slabs of meat to be exploited, driving a car does not mean freedom or equality,Twenty thousand jobs in britain at the cost of a few lives in a far off country, some rules never change.

michael joseph heavey, cahersiveen>adams towns, madness

I helped on a voluntary basis at one of Britains first re-cyling sites in Middleton, Manchester back in the 1980s and we were in constant battles with the council over help with the funding. They did not help us for years, and then suddenly demanded that they take over the site . Hypocritically, this was so that the Council could reach re-cycling figures imposed on them by the government. Why can't Britain as a whole actually try and do what is right for the Planet for once and be years ahead of the pack, and not do it begrudgingly just to reach the latest targets

Andy McDowall, Blackburn, England

I'll dump it in my back yard thank you!

Andrew, Stoke, UK

How will councils determine the charges? How will councils know which house to charge, and how much? Will the councils in question refund the current charges for bin collection? Currently, the rubbish in the area in which I reside is collected thus: the refuse collectors come round, collect all the bin bags from the respective bins, pile them all at the side of the street, then the wagon appears, loads-up the rubbish and goes about its business. Will the councils leave it to the refuse collectors to note how many bags of rubbish they have collected and from whose home they came, i.e. number 20 = 3 bags, number 22 = 7 bags; you get the point! Will the refuse collectors then submit their collection forms to the local council offices, from where a bill is issued to the respective houses? What utter nonsense! The people who come up with these ideas are supposed to have an education; have they actually thought it through? I very much doubt it! Reduce packaging at source.

Fed-Up with Labour, Horley,

we live in an area with fornightly collectinos, and still only ever half fill our wheelie bin. However, we tend to put our rubbish out around 7:00 on the night before collection - If I go out a couple of hours later, I find that my bin has been filled to the top by other people. How will councils stop this? My bin goes out on a quiet back road behind the houses, its too easy for people to be dishonest in this way. The bin lorry tends to come at around 7:00 so I risk missing it if I wait until the morning to put my bin out.

aj, bristol,

Millions of tons of packaging are being produced as you read this most if not all of it destined for the dustbin. Isn't the right way to tackle waste at the source? shouldn't we be using taxation and regulation on the manufacturers and retailers?

John Goh, Welwyn Garden City, UK

i would recycle if it wa easier

Lizie, Birmingham,

Just one more tax, never mind plenty places to dump. I simply refuse to pay any more taxes.

John Smith, Manchester, Lancashire

Just passing on (maybe amplifying as usual) another directive from our Lords and Masters in Brussels, no doubt.

Stan(expat), USA, USA

Sorry, but how exactly is this going to work for people who live in flats with communal bins?

Susanna, London, London

Can anyone name a scheme that was dropped after being 'piloted' ?

Invariably, those who run the schemes deem them to be a 'success', having never stated how success/failure will be measured.

Seems like we'll be paying twice for rubbish soon, once via council tax, once via pay-as-you-throw.

CB, Epsom, England

Sorry but does this government actually know what it 's doing? Last week this widely accepted as unpopular policy was shelved. Suddenly it is back on again! So let me get this straight, here we are in the 21st Century where our domestic waste is collected fortnightly.

This leaves our bins smelling and, despite all best efforts of wrapping food waste as advised, crawling with maggots during very hot weather. This fact is either acceptable to the inappropriate penny pinching councils and the government or just being ignored.

I am all for recycling but an unacceptable amount of recyclable material is apparantly still, 4 years later, unable to be recycled by our council. So surely they should be recycling everything that can be before they start a stealth tax for us disposing the items that they cannot be bothered to recycle! And lets not forget the Council Tax has continually increased yet the number of collections have declined so we are paying more for a decresed service!

Steve Rothery, Fareham,

It's just another tax for us to pay. We'll end up paying over and over for rubbish dumping, not just our own but all the thicko's who will refuse to pay and who will then fly tip, we'll have to pay for the clean up. Sadly not everyone recycles their rubbish or pays attention to packaging and those are the people who will refuse to pay for their rubbish to be collected.

Kazinski, Worthing,

How many more times do we have to pay for the same thing? What are we paying our council tax for? Once again this Government shows its contempt for the people it is supposed to represent. Whilst I accept the need for responsible environmental management, I take exception at being treated like an idiot. His Government has wasted more money on botched endeavours - NHS computer systems... and we're left picking up the tab in order to finance something that we've already paid for time after time.
Gordon Brown and his trusted few should just tell us the truth. Tell us you're not up to the job and we'll find somebody else who might just tell us how it really is!
A good bill to hide lots of bills in! Sound familiar?

Jutta Hewett, Shrewsbury,

Instead of taxing the consumers, why not tax the plastic and paper manufacturers? By increasing their costs, the supermarkets might think twice before they shrink wrap my cucumbers.

And what are the councils going to do with this extra income? Improve the collection service, perhaps?

Dan Fox, Birmingham,

Make people pay proportionately for the amount of waste they produce? What a silly idea!! People should be able to go about creating as much waste as they like with impunity, its our god given right isn't it? After all, resources are infinite, there are no everyone has access to as much materials as they need, we are not spoilt westerners...

A good proportion of the population in the UK are capable of ensuring that recycling forms a part of their every day chores, even if you do have to bag plastics, tins, and paper seperately and take them to your nearest recycling facilities. If you think there aren't enough depots nearby - complain to your local councils!

The government should figure out prior to implementing said schemes how to make facilities more accessible to those who are not particularly mobile, and should make recylcing bins more prolific, but there are numerous councils that already collect paper, plastics and metals from your doorstep or nearabouts. Take responsibility.

Daniel Carlin, Epsom, Surrey

Does the government not realise that this will just encourage people to move their rubbish into other peope's bins? If you're overweight you can get away with it by sneakily dumping your litter in someone elses bin and making them pay for it, I guess that's one way to annoy the people you don't like but hardly a useful policy.

Simon Challis, Lincoln, England

The effluent society.

Andrew Milner, Yokohama, Japan

Tipping is looking like a good idea

Phill Barlow, Merseyside, England

In terms of carrot and stick, this is the stick against the consumer.Tesco's chairman has always publicly stated Tesco is not interested in stick methods only the carrot method - it won't / doesn't want to harm sales/force customers for the sake of the environment.Trouble is the other side of the coin, money can be made by councils from penalizing excess packaging in your bin. So if Tesco and Councils work together-rather than reduce waste it is increased as there is no incentive for either side, both make money from packaging. This method relies on a customer backlash - people physically leaving the packaging with the retailer at point of sale, but as more transactions are carried out online - this too minimizes the impact on the retailer.
What the retailers lose in reducing packaging is shelf life, and it would take an awlful lot of pressure on retailer to reduce the shelf life of products as this directly affects profits, so why they may appear to be turning green don't bank on it

Adam Jarvis, UK, UK

Why can't we look at this from another perspective. There seem to be a lot of businesses set up to profit from refuse, as well as from recycling. They would not have been set up if they weren't intending to make a profit.

Therefore why not offer incentives to recycle; even money, dirty word that it is.

Councils clearly look at the refuse/recycling business as a problem that will cost their council tax payers, at home owners. Why can they not look at it as a profit opportunity for the community?

Tim, London,

There was no way this new tax was going to be stopped. No matter what the government says. The Britsh people are being ripped off once again. Giving local councils the right to impose taxes is like giving Dracula the key to the blood bank.

The very idea that council tax will go down as a result is in the realms of pigs in the sky.

Peter Hodge, Skelmersdale, England

Yet another method of taxation from our government. Would the average person on the street be in a position to throw away less rubbish? Probably not. The only way I can see a scheme like this working is if:
1) the scheme is tax neutral so that everyone gets a discount off their council tax in lieu of rubbish tax
2) residents are 'taxed' on the size of their wheely bin, just like in Germany.

Paying tax per bag is silly. Paying tax by weight is desperately short sighted given that there is nothing to stop you putting your rubbish into next doors bin (or down the road!). I hope the government calls an election soon!

Martin Andrews, Berks, England

Gordan Brown is a sneaky individual, Do labour voters really think he is wanting help them? he is making the poor poorer by all the sneaky taxes he has introduced. If I may quote "people get the government they deserve!. When Britain wakes up to this Scottish fraudster (Referendum) then they might be able to get there country back. somehow I do not think this is going to happen as politicians in the UK use the inherent goodness of the working class by by using emotional blackmail and forcing them to vote on for, all intents and purposes, along tribal lines. such a waste of a once great country.Wake up please!

Alan, Manchester, UK

If local authorities wish to bring in these 'pilot schemes' then I suggest they first ensure that they are collecting everything that can be recycled.
Most councils only accept a small portion of recyclable materials, and householders have no option but to put the rest in the rubbish bin.
Why should householders pay yet again for the failures of their local councils to recycle enough?

C Bevitt, Nottingham, UK

If you want to reduce the overall flow of garbage why not just replace the GIGANTIC unsightly wheelie-bins that sully most inner-city neighbourhoods with smaller more reasonably-sized bins? That's what I would call being 'enviromentally friendly'.

bob, london,