Recycle, Repair, Reuse

Recycle, Repair, Reuse, Reduce

  • Robert Dyas recycles Brita Water Filters

    Take your Plastic Water Filters into Robert Dyas for recycling

    Click for the website

  • Sainsburys offers recycling for flexible plastics

    Following a successful trial in the North East of England, 520 Sainsbury’s stores will now offer a recycling system for all flexible plastics.

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  • Projects funded by Waitrose have made a positive difference to the environment, according to a report. Plan Plastic

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What Happens to your recycling - watch the video to find out more

Plastic Reduction

Plastic Free Community in Brockham


The Parish Council has pledged to reduce Single Use Plastic in Brockham and are aiming for a Status of Plastic Free from Surfers Against Sewage.


We would like local businesses to make a pledge and also to sign up 10 allies in our community who will help spread the word to reduce single use plastic. 


Becoming a Plastic Free Community does not mean we’ve eliminated all plastic but completed some groundwork to tackling single-use plastic where we live. Some plastic is useful and essential. It’s how we use plastic that is the problem. When we say plastic free we mean the avoidable single-use stuff that’s everywhere.


Help us complete our list of alternatives to plastic when you do your shopping - click on the button above.  Tell us what you use instead of plastic.


Did you know we use 38.5 million plastic bottles every day in the UK?

Water Refill

Wednesday 16 June 2021 was World Refill Day, a global public awareness campaign to help prevent plastic pollution and encourage people to live with less waste by choosing to reuse. We have been fully behind the urgent push to tackle avoidable plastic waste. In setting up our local initiative, local businesses have joined the scheme and become a water Refill Station; enabling passers-by to come and fill up their bottle for free.

  • The Reading Room Coffee & Cake House
  • The Shop at Strood Green 
  • Southdown Kitchen 


Repair

Before you recycle, consider if you can fix it.  Expand the shelf life of your possessions. Make the most out of whatever you buy and have, and only pass it on when there’s nothing left to do with it.  So many of our things are just discarded because they are damaged or not working. Items disposed of end up in landfill or incinerated, increasing dangerous emissions. The average household in the UK produces more than one tonne of waste every year.  

Our first repair cafe was a great success !   We held this in September.  Please let us know if you would like us to repeat this regularly.


The concept of Repair Cafes was started by Martine Postma in Amsterdam in 2009, who had become frustrated with the developed world’s throwaway culture. She began producing a guide for her community with tips on how to produce less waste – mainly by fixing or repairing things that would have otherwise gone into the bin. The idea spread, and there are now an estimated 1,500 Repair Cafés located in 33 countries.

Reuse - Clothing

The continual drive for ‘fast fashion’ (low cost, mass produced clothing) adds to the growing waste problem, amounting to 10,000 items of clothing being sent to landfill every five minutes, equivalent to £140m in value every year!


It has a huge impact on natural resources too – it takes around 1,800 gallons of water to make a single pair of jeans. According to recent Barnardo’s research 1 in 3 women feel that their clothes are outdated after less than 3 wears. Clothes swaps offer the best of both worlds; a chance to revamp your wardrobe whilst extending the life of your clothes allowing them to be used and loved again.

Our first clothes swap/ swishing event held in August was very successful thanks to to the env group for organising and the community for pariticpating.  This will be part of a series of Clothes Swap days, each with a different focus. 


Our aim is to fight fast fashion by swapping, not shopping and have some fun at the same time.   Drop-off ladieswear in the morning and receive a voucher to spend in the afternoon.


You donate good quality clothes and get a voucher swap for new-to-you clothes!


Check back to see what's happeniing in January for kids clothes swapping.

Upcycle Crisp Packets to help the Homeless

We welcome volunteers to enable Brockham to Reuse Crisp Packets and convert them to a life saving blanket for the homeless.  


Click on the video on the left to see how they are made.

Boomerang Bag Scheme - Reuse, Reduce, Return

We have joined the Boomerang Bags initiative to re-use material and create reusable bags for free for our local shops and customers.


What is Boomerang Bags all about?

Boomerang Bags is a not-for-profit organisation tackling plastic bag pollution at its source. We engage communities in the development of an innovative alternative to single use plastic bags – community made, reusable bags from preloved, recycled or reclaimed materials.


Boomerang Bags works to increase awareness about plastic pollution and foster sustainable behaviour at a grass-roots level through creating conscious, connected communities. Our volunteers collect and upcycle unwanted material, diverting thousands of kilograms of waste from landfill, and create a platform where communities can connect, socialise, learn new skills and contribute positively to the local community, building social capital and developing environment stewardship. 

The bags are then made available to local communities at markets, events and festivals, libraries, schools and businesses to provide sustainable alternatives to plastic, creating conversations about the importance of re-use, caring for our planet and each other and fostering sustainable behaviour. 


Join the Brockham Parish Council Environment Working Group to help make more bags and reduce plastic in our village.

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