nlillitos@thekmgroup.co.uk

A Charitable Maidstone man, who has collected some 50,000 spectacles over the last 10 years for re-use in poor countries, says he will have to stop because of short sighted officials.

Bryan McCarthy, twice president of Maidstone Lions, has for the last decade been taking empty glasses cases for disposal at the Tovil waste recycle site run by Kent County Council.

The kind-hearted 76-year-old, of Forstall Road, Aylesford, collects the unwanted spectacles from collection boxes at Maidstone Hospital, opticians, and doctors’ surgeries.

Glasses in good condition are sent to a collection centre for eventual dispatch to the needy abroad.

But the empty cases, about 600 a month, are not included in the overseas packaging. So Mr McCarthy takes them to the Burial Ground recycling site.

"When I was last there an official challenged me for the first time in all these years of coming, to say I was bringing commercial waste to a household tip.
She said I would have to pay for a licence and then take the cases to a special Medway depot.

"I explained to the lady that these cases were not commercial waste, that they had been owned by individuals but she would have none of it.

"Now it looks like I’ll have to stop my charity work as I can’t afford to go through all this bureaucratic palaver and distance in travelling. It’s a very short-sighted attitude. There didn’t seem to be any discretion exercised.”

A KCC spokesman insisted the official was correct.

"Charity waste is classed as commercial waste and needs a special permit to use sites designated purely for household waste.”

Full story in your Kent Messenger - out every Friday.