FIVE million blue waste bags will start to be delivered to residents in Wokingham Borough this week.

The bags, which are used for non-recyclable waste, will be delivered to households over the next five weeks, with each property receiving a total of 80 bags each.

However, residents may notice a change to their bags as, due to a manufacturing error, the bags will feature four ties rather than two handles for this year only. But the council has assured residents this is a one-off, and the bags will be the same size and quality as before.

Waste collections will continue to be on a weekly basis and the number of bags each household receives will not reduce.

Some residents will see a change to the day their garden waste is collected, and will be contacted by the council by letter. 

From this week, residents are able to add plastic pots, tubs, trays, clean foil, foil trays as well as food and drink cartons to their kerbside recycling collections, and residents will be receiving more information on this from re3. Tins, cans, paper, cardboard, plastic bottles and aerosols can still be recycled as usual.

Cllr Simon Weeks, Wokingham Borough Council's executive member for planning and enforcement, said: "While the blue bag allocation takes residents up until the end of March 2018 and equates to one and a half bags a week, we hope that being able to increase the number of items that are accepted in our kerbside collections, we can see a significant reduction in the amount of household waste that we produce as a borough.”