Plastic bags in the jungle report due to be published tomorrow (Friday) by Milton Keynes Council

The council no longer issues pink recycling sacks

The council called for an independent review of its recycling systems after TV personality Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall found some old MK pink sacks in a mountain of rubbish while filming for a BBC documentary called War on Plastic.Now, at yesterday’s meeting of the full council, the Cabinet member for the public realm, Cllr Emily Darlington (Lab, Bletchley East), revealed that the Conservative opposition will see the report tomorrow (Friday). The council today (Thursday) confirmed it will be “circulating some information” tomorrow.

Cllr Darlington, responding to a question from Tory Cllr Dan Gilbert (Loughton & Shenley), said: “The leader of the council commissioned an independent report. We were the only one of the councils named in that documentary to do so.

“I saw an initial draft back in August. You should be seeing that on Friday. It would then be issued alongside our response, and you’ll see it then.”

Cllr Gilbert confirmed he had a meeting in his diary for Friday.

He added: “Its now been two full councils since we were promised something and I wonder if Cllr Darlington would accept the principle that when an independent report has been commissioned, there should be no public comment on it until this council and members of the public had a chance to scrutinise it at the same time.”

Cllr Darlington, who revealed to the media in August that the draft report had found that the council was not at fault, said: “We are trying to be as open and transparent as possible.

“When you see how technical, and how much detail they have gone into it you will see the length of time it did for them to do it. I’m very pleased that they have done such an effective report because we want to maintain confidence in our recycling facilities and recycling collection. This report really helps us do that.”

Both Cllr Darlington, and council leader Cllr Pete Marland (Lab, Wolverton), have previously said that they had confidence that the sacks could not have come direct from the council.