We love David M.

If there was ever polictician to praise, it must be Environment Secretary David Miliband. No, I'm not in the Labour party, they didn't bribe me or anything. I just think that he takes his job seriously and tackles a serious problem. One that has been left unnoticed, indeed ignored for far too long. I'm talking rubbish, I mean about waste and avoiding waste in particular. I am aware that after announcing the Government's plans everybody feared that the wheelie bin chips will trigger a spy rather than an environment programme.

The most important part for me, however, was that someone mentions the enourmous waste in this country. The Independent ran a brilliant campaign against waste - i.e. waste as in unnecessary items such as packagin or most interestingly carrier bags. I was shocked when I heard that Teso alone gave out four billion - this is 4,000,000,000 - carrier bags to customers last year.

The mere fact that Miliband mentioned carrier bags seems remarkable to me. He talked not only about recycling quotas the UK needs to meet, he actually talked about avoiding waste. That's the point, you don't need to recycle somehting that has never been produced and used in the first place.

So, take your carrier bag to the shop and refuse new ones. I have to tell the assisstants over and over again as they already have the new bag in their hands when I arrive at the till. But they'll learn if more people refuse it.

Of course it remains to be seen if the Government really acts though on this problem. And if Miliband will still be in his job after 27th June.