How to stop junk mail - Carmarthenshire News

A helpful reader has written referring me to his website in which he provides invaluable advice for all those who do not wish to receive the Council's plastic-wrapped Pravda shoved through their letterboxes. Of course, some of you find that it makes useful kindling, cat litter and hamster bedding, but for everyone else, here is what he has to say:

The March-April 2012 edition of Carmarthenshire’s official propaganda sheet “Carmarthenshire News” dropped on my mat this week. I’ll leave it to others to trawl through it and expose the reality behind the rose-tinted image it promotes. Personally I don’t care if every word in it was true and written by the Almighty himself, I just don’t want plastic wrapped junk mail dropping through my letterbox.

Out of the letterbox, into the recycling bag

The 2001 census states that Carmartheshire has 73,100 households. Each household I presume receives a copy of Carmarthenshire News which weighs a convenient 100 grammes, (95g paper and 5g plastic wrapper). This means each issue uses 7,000 kilos (7 tonnes) of paper and 300 kilos of plastic. Each year that’s 42 tonnes of paper and 1.8 tonnes of plastic.

So what can we do about it?

If you want to read Carmarthenshire News but not contribute to the waste mountain, you could  read it online instead, then stop the printed copy being delivered. To do this simply email Delna M Hockenhull the Communications Manager for  Carmarthenshire News at DMHockenhull@carmarthenshire.gov.uk and ask to be removed from the distribution list. I did just that this week and (apart from her spelling my name wrong) I think I got a result.

You may need to hurry, though, because if Plaid Cymru win the council elections, they have pledged to scrap it. Let's hope they chuck PRSirgar, the council's very own PR agency, and the spin meisters in the Press Office on the bonfire along with it.