Thurrock Council has introduced special bin tags to let residents know why waste crews have been unable to empty their recycling bin.

The bright orange 'Ooops...' tags will be used to help residents understand when something that cannot be recycled has been put in their blue bin and give them the information they need to identify items and remove them.

If residents put the wrong type of waste in their blue bins it can contaminate a whole lorry load of recycling. Contaminated loads cannot be recycled and are much more expensive to dispose of as waste.

Aaron Watkins, councillor for environment, said: "Recycling is important, the more we can recycle the better it is for the planet and for our future on Earth. It's great to see so many residents recycling but we know we have to do something to help guide residents when sometimes the wrong things are mistakenly placed in recycling bins which can result in non-collection.

"In the past, residents wouldn’t know why their bin hadn’t been collected and we hope these 'Ooops...' can go some way to helping residents understand why. We have introduced these tags to let people know when something has gone in the wrong bin and make sure they have the information to hand to help them remove it and make sure their recycling can all be collected to be re-used next time."

Any resident who finds an 'Ooops...' tag on their recycling bin should check it to see what needs to be removed. For information on what can be recycled, go to thurrock.gov.uk/recycling.

Once items that shouldn’t be in the recycling bin have been removed, the recycling will be collected as normal on the next round.