England may be moving towards greater consistency in household recycling, but new analysis suggests residents still face a sometimes bewildering array of local instructions about what can go in which container – and how items should be prepared before they get there.1
Since 31 March, the government’s Simpler Recycling rules have required waste collectors in England to provide collections covering a common set of materials, including paper and card, glass, metal, plastics and food waste.2 The reforms are intended to end longstanding variations in what households can recycle, although councils retain considerable flexibility over how materials are collected.
An analysis of recycling guidance in 58 UK urban areas by waste collection firm BusinessWaste.co.uk suggests that, at the level of instructions presented to householders, significant differences remain.
The company assessed the number of recycling instructions and exclusions published by councils, alongside the Flesch Reading Ease of their online guidance, to produce a “confusion score”.
Bromley emerged as the most complex of the areas examined, with a score of 71.9 out of 100 and 81 separate rules and exclusions identified on its website.
Some of the individual requirements illustrate the difficulties householders can encounter. In Bromley, Tetra Paks are placed in the green box rather than the black paper box, while plastic plant pots can be recycled unless they are black.
Bristol ranked second and had the largest number of rules and restrictions – 108 – although its guidance achieved a relatively high readability score. Among the more detailed requirements, shoes for recycling must be wearable, paired, tied together and dry, and placed inside a labelled carrier bag.
The analysis also identified an apparent inconsistency in guidance from West Northamptonshire. Its summary information directs residents to put hard plastics such as washing-up bowls in general rubbish, while more detailed plastics guidance says they should be taken to a household recycling centre.
Other examples include Enfield’s instruction that aluminium foil should be formed into a fist-sized ball, and guidance in York requiring residents to separate the plastic lid and cardboard body of some tubes – unless the tube has a foil lining, in which case it goes into household waste.
At the other end of the ranking, Birmingham had the least confusing guidance of the areas examined. Researchers counted 23 rules and restrictions and gave its wording a Flesch Reading Ease score of 85.5. Havering, Haringey, Hackney and Plymouth also featured among the areas with the simplest guidance.
The findings should perhaps be treated cautiously, with the number of instructions or exclusions not a definitive indicator, surely, of how difficult residents actually find a recycling system. Similarly, the analysis did not measure household behaviour or contamination rates.
However, the findings suggest that even as Simpler Recycling brings greater consistency to the materials councils collect, householders can still face complicated and sometimes highly specific instructions about exactly how to recycle them.
Defra’s own Simpler Recycling guidance says local authorities should provide clear information about what can and cannot be recycled in each waste stream in order to reduce confusion. Plastic films and bags will be added to the materials that must be collected from households from March 2027. However it does also say: “You can decide how to collect dry recyclable waste streams, depending on local circumstances.”
Mark Hall, commercial waste specialist at BusinessWaste.co.uk, said recycling decisions were often made within seconds and residents were unlikely to consult several council webpages whenever they encountered an unfamiliar item.
“If an answer depends on a minor detail, such as its colour, lining or whether two parts need separating, many will either guess or throw it in their general waste bin,” he said.
He added that councils should keep their core household rules on a single current webpage, use consistent names for containers and place exemptions alongside the items to which they apply.
Notes
[1] BusinessWaste.co.uk, “Council recycling guidance varies sharply across UK, data finds“. Analysis of household recycling guidance across 58 UK urban areas, 2026.
[2] Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs, Simpler recycling: household recycling in England, updated 13 May 2025; requirements effective 31 March 2026.
