Sir, - Congratulations on your excellent and comprehensive coverage of the issues associated with waste disposal.
Up to this the approach of our ministers and their minions has been to blame the citizen. We are not to blame!
There is urgent need for a comprehensive centralised waste management plan setting standards and targets for waste management throughout the country within a given period. As your feature points out, 94 per cent recycling is achieved in Germany. Is there any reason to accept that we are less gifted than the Germans?
There is no need to re-invent the wheel or to come up with any more excuses. Recycling must come before incineration as upon its success the need for incineration will be reassessed. If we achieve the totally realistic results of Germany there will be only 6 per cent left to deal with.
All we need is a proper infrastructure, involving coloured bags or marked bins. We also need something like the German Packaging Ordinance which requires retailers and manufacturers to take back or arrange for the recycling of all packaging material.
Incineration is obviously the worst choice. It is clearly in the commercial interest of those installing incinerators to endeavour to justify them by maximising rather than minimising their use. We might even, God forbid, have to import waste from other areas to keep our proposed incinerators working at maximum capacity.
I strongly feel that our public representatives should stand up and be counted on this issue so that we can use our votes effectively next time around. Let's not have another Mullaghmore! - Yours, etc.,
Michael Gorman, Sandymount, Dublin 4.