SIR – Since April 1, 2013, local authorities have been responsible for improving the health of their local population.

I mentioned this at a meeting of Worcester City Council’s Environment Committee on October 31 in relation to a waste strategy document that stated that ‘there are no plans (by Worcestershire County Council, Herefordshire Council and the district councils within the two counties) to separately measure and report emissions from waste management services’.

I wonder what James Thornton, founding chief executive of ClientEarth, would say about this?

He forced the Government to act on illegal levels of air pollution and will be speaking at The Hive on November 22. The aforementioned document also stated that ‘the 50 per cent recycling target will be difficult to achieve without introducing separate food waste collection or free garden waste collection to all households’.

Perhaps instead of spending millions of pounds on an incinerator, we could have invested in a food waste collection service, which, as demonstrated by other councils across the UK, would have improved recycling rates?

Or at least other councillors could publicly acknowledge and challenge so-called ‘austerity’: ‘Since 2011, there have been significant cuts to local authority funding…As a result, the aspirations and targets set within the Joint Municipal Waste Management Strategy for Herefordshire and Worcestershire are increasingly challenging’.

For the sake of our own health, we need a change in Government.

CLLR NEIL LAURENSON

St Stephen ward