Recycling firm Recresco has been fined £50,000 for safety failings after a worker lost his hand when it became trapped in an unguarded conveyor belt.

Neil Parish, Conservative MP for Tiverton and Honiton and former farmer, has been elected as Chairman of the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee for the 2015 Parliament.

The London Borough of Ealing has agreed to move from weekly kerbside-sort recycling collections to fortnightly co-mingled collections in a bid to increase recycling and save money.

Southern Plastics Recycling Ltd has been fined £1,500 for violating health and safety regulations after a worker was injured falling from an industrial waste bin.

Bunzl Catering Supplies, Benders Paper Cups and BASIS have joined the Simply Cups paper cup recycling service, which now includes five additional materials.

The European Parliament Environment Committee has voted through a draft report on the circular economy, which calls on the European Commission to increase recycling targets to ‘at least’ 70 per cent.

The European Commission has launched a consultation on ‘the nature and the extent of regulatory failures causing undue distortions to EU waste markets for recycling and recovery’.

Liz Goodwin has been recognised with an OBE ‘for services to Business Resource Efficiency and the Environment’ in the Queen’s Birthday Honours 2015.

Bristol City Council has announced that it has ‘mutually agreed’ with its waste contractor Kier to terminate the current waste collection and street cleansing contract.

The Plastics 2020 consortium has announced it will launch the Plastics Industry Recycling Action Plan (PIRAP) at the Plastics Recycling Expo (PRE) in Telford.