Temporary skips for paper and metals during festive period

Orkney Islands Council is opening temporary skips for paper and metals recycling over the festive period.

The skips, located at the Council’s Garson and Hatston waste facilities, will be in place to help households who will miss a recycling collection of these materials due to festive public holidays.

Lorna Richardson, Strategic Policy and Projects Manager, said: “We are still operating to strict pandemic guidelines which means that we can only collect two materials each fortnight. With the usual suspension of recycling collections between Christmas and New Years it means that unfortunately there will be a longer gap than usual between the collections of metals and paper for many households.

“We know many people do their best to recycle and we appreciate their ongoing efforts. We also know it is difficult for some households despite their best intentions to store recyclables for that long. We hope the temporary extra skips will be of help to those households.”

Capacity at the temporary sites will be limited (and will be subject to reduced festive opening hours) so householders who can store them until the next collection are urged to do so.

Westray residents are reminded there is a recycling point at the pierhead.

Recycling collections return to normal on Tuesday 5 January 2021 starting with glass and plastic, with metals and paper the fortnight starting 18 January. Check your next collection and recycling centre opening times on the Council website.