The recycling rate has reached a record high in Brighton and Hove, according to new data, the council said.
The figures show an increase of 7.2 percentage points and follow Labour’s pledge to improve the dismal recycling rate as one of its key goals when it took charge in May 2023.
Since then, the party said that it had made a series of improvements – first, adding new bins for food and drink cartons and electrical items and then adding a wider range of plastics to kerbside and communal collections last year.
In September 2025, Brighton and Hove City Council started weekly food waste collections and now collects almost 500 tons of food waste a month.
All this work is now starting to show in the data, Labour said, with figures for January to March lifting the recycling rate to 31.6 per cent, the highest level ever recorded in Brighton and Hove.
The 7.2-point improvement is for the first quarter of the calendar year compared with the same quarter last year.
There was a corresponding fall in “residual waste”, the general refuse that is sent to the “energy recovery facility” – commonly referred to as the incinerator – in Newhaven.
Labour councillor Tim Rowkins, deputy leader and cabinet member for net zero and environmental services, said: “Sorting out our recycling was one of the main reasons I decided to stand for election.
“We’d all been told that it wasn’t possible due to a historical waste contract but, having read the contract myself, I knew that was not the case.
“Residents up and down the city were incredulous that a city like Brighton and Hove could have some of the worst recycling rates in the country.
“We’ve had two Green-run councils and a Green MP and yet we still had to chuck our yoghurt pots in the bin.
“This new data finally shows the reversal of the downward trend and makes us even more determined to continue making more improvements.”
He added that, soon, more materials would be included in recycling collections and that the council was planning a communications blitz on contamination – people putting materials in their recycling that cannot be recycled.
Brighton and Hove was the first council in Sussex to bring in food waste collections after Lewes District Council which has recycled food waste for some years.
Obviously Tim will be well aware that the council didn’t choose to bring in food recycling – it was brought in under the Conservative government’s Environment Act 2021.
He will also be well aware that having a Green MP will have no impact whatsoever on how a council operates, but it sure does sound like a good line of attack!
He should also be aware that he’s lying – or at the very least stretching the truth – about the Veolia contract. In fact, the council itself (under a previous Labour administration) claimed it was being prevented from recycling some materials because waste contractor Veolia was refusing to alter the terms of its PFI waste disposal contract.
But truth is extremely flexible under Sankey’s Labour council.
Well done to the people who have commented already to highlight what a load of rubbish (pun intended) Cllr Tim Rowkins is spouting.
It just looks dodgy and dishonest to gloss over important facts, like the fact the 2024 changes in legislation forced councils EVERYWHERE to collect and recycle items, like yoghurt pots. The government also gave Brighton and Hove City Council millions in new burdens funding to implement the new legislation – which included a lump sum of £2.4 MILLION to set up a food waste service and they also received a payment of around £5.3 MILLION from the new Extended Producer Responsibility money (collected from companies based on packaging waste).
If Tim did in fact read the contract, I wonder if he also read details of Veolia previously saying how much money it would cost to instal the equipment needed to recycle yoghurt pots and that they (Veolia) would not pay for this?
Great that legislation changed and that there was government funding that came with it, so the council could make sure the recycling depot now has the equipment needed installed to make sure expanded recycling could happen.(funding from prev Tory government bizarrely not the current Labour one, the legislation also passed under the Tories)
Once again disappointing to see a Cabinet member in Bella’s Labour administration truth-twisting like this and missing out key details – it reflects badly on them as a whole.
Possibly but the city is actually seeing things being done under Labour. All I remember the Greens doing is contributing to climate change by constantly talking and talking and spouting hot air.
We need a city that is moving forward and things are getting done.
Little by little things are changing.
Three points:
1) The Previous Conservative Government brought in The Separation of Waste (England) Regulations 2024, which forced councils to collect food waste and all plastics if they weren’t already doing so. So this wasn’t an initiative by Labour. The Government provided additional funding, alongside council funding.
2) The Greens have only ever run the council as a minority and so have always been dependent on other parties to pass anything.
3) Previous calls for food waste trials never got off the ground because all three main parties in Brighton & Hove didn’t see it as a priority, there wasn’t any additional Government funding and the council was dealing with massive Government cuts to council services.
It’s no use residents recycling if the council don’t collect it though and many roads can go a month or two without collection. Please tell the other side of the story about how recycling collection rates have nosedived, particularly since the food bin collection service was rolled out. They just don’t have the capacity. Or enough reliable dustcarts with up to 40% of them off the road for repairs at any given time. Also Cllr Rowkins doesn’t mention that the 30 year contract with Veolia entails selling our waste to that company to transport it toi Newhaven Energy Reovery Plant to burn it and turn into into electricity to sell off.
So what REALLY happens to our recycled items – typically the most burnable? Has Cllr Rowkins travelled on the same journey as our waste to find out what really happens to it when it gets to Newhaven?
If only there was a simpler explanation.
The “Green” party record on recycling was DIRE.
No. It was worse than dire.
Due to the Veolia contract. It has been no better under Labour administrations until the Environment Act 2021 kicked in and forced councils to collect food waste and all plastics if they weren’t before. As a cabinet member, Tim is well aware of that fact, but is choosing to obfuscate instead.
Doh – Tim is wrong again, there have been 2 Green MPs elected in Brighton and Hove.
If he is under the strange (and incorrect) belief that MPs have any direct influence on the council’s bin collections, he may also want to note that since Brighton and Hove City Council merged, there have been 5 Labour MPs (in addition to the 2 Green ones). Tim may also want to refresh his knowledge on what a council is responsible for and what Parliament is responsible for. By implying MPs are somehow responsible for council matters suggests a worrying misunderstanding of the different roles councillors and MPs have on Tim’s part. I’ve listed MPs in case Cllr Rowkins has a problem understanding facts and interpreting detail:
Labour – 5 MPs since 1997 – (Ivor Caplin, Celia Barlow, Peter Kyle, Lloyd Russell-Moyle and Chris Ward)
Conservative – 2 MPs since 1997 (Mike Weatherley and Simon Kirby)
Green – 2 MPs since 1997 (Caroline Lucas and Sian Berry)
Hope this helps clear things up for Tim. His inference about MP influence in council operational decisions does beg the question though, were the 5 Labour MPs just not interested in improving recycling rates in the past if he is implying MPs from other parties weren’t…
FYI – Tim may be interested to know that during the same timeframe there have been 6 Labour-led administrations at Brighton and Hove City Council, and there only would have been 1 Green-led administration had the 2019 Labour administration not collapsed due to infighting in 2020).
Facts are important, and as Tim seems to have got his facts wrong in many areas in what he says, just correcting his MP one and flagging there have been 5 Labour MPs (in case he had simply forgotten).