Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:
To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what assessment his Department has made of the potential merits of introducing fines for people who fail to recycle household waste in order to increase recycling rates.
Councils already have a range of powers to intervene though we think it is better for councils to work with householders and help them to recycle more, rather than punish them for getting things wrong. That is why criminal penalties were removed in 2015.