RADICAL recycling reforms have been proposed by a Ribble Valley councillor.

Councillor Allan Knox has put forward a motion, which will be read at the full council meeting tonight, to reduce the amount of green glass being used in the borough.

Although he supports recycling efforts in the Ribble Valley, Coun Knox said that there is a glut of green glass.

He is asking councillors to support the British Glass Manufacturers' Confederation's "Stop On Green" campaign, which is pressing for change from green to other types of glass. His motion asks the council to contact Ribble Valley MP Nigel Evans, the 10 members of European Parliament for the North West and Lancashire County Council to get their support for the campaign. Coun Knox also wants leading supermarkets in the borough -- Booths, Tesco, Sainsbury's and Safeway -- to change their purchasing policies to reduce the amount of green glass used.

In his motion, he says: "This council is committed to the highest practicable rate of recycling as part of the Ribble Valley community's contribution to an overall waste strategy for Lancashire. However it recognises this will not be achieved without significant controls from Government and business to ensure thriving markets for recycled materials.

"Experience in Ribble Valley has already shown that voluntary effort cannot ultimately succeed if the markets for recyclables fail to develop and thrive.

The short-lived project to recycle plastic bottles based at Edisford School and the continuing pressure on school-based paper recycling schemes illustrate the problems.

"One area where a market glut looms, yet could be surmounted, is with green glass, one of the earliest and most successful forms of recycling."