WARRINGTON Borough Council indicated that in 2013-14 they collected around 90,000 tonnes of waste.

They visited 89,000 properties weekly for collection and managed to recycle around 42 per cent of it all.

With Christmas presents and festivities wrapping and packaging comes in bulk.

The three Warrington recycling sites will be swamped with cardboard, plastic and polystyrene as soon as new year hits.

The irony is perhaps that packaging is something you pay for but which you generally do not want.

It also costs you to get rid of it, as part of your council tax bill and in time and fuel for a trip to the tip.

So you’re paying twice!

Protection of the product is important of course, no-one wants to receive damaged goods but some manufacturers ‘upgrade’ the packaging to create a premium image.

For which they charge accordingly. There are different ways of dealing with this of course.

Legislation was introduced in 2003 which should prevent retailers and manufacturers from using excess packaging.

In practice prosecution is very rare and fines relatively small. Sweden has a different approach.

You have a right to take it back to the provider. Just imagine the scene at Argos on January 2!

LAWRENCE Bellamy is associate dean at the University of Chester's Padgate campus and writes a regular column for business.