Tonbridge and Malling residents are being asked to reduce their Christmas rubbish this year by going ‘green’ and recycling.

In the build up to Christmas, the amount of junk mail increases significantly, with companies taking the opportunity to promote their products and services.

Residents may not realise that they can recycle junk mail using their green box service.

As well as newspapers and magazines, the green box can be used to recycle all junk mail as well as plain paper gift-wrap, catalogues, directories and other mail.

It should also be used for all food and drinks cans and tins, as well as tin foil, foil food trays and empty aerosols.

For every tonne of recycling collected from the green box scheme, £1 is donated to the Kent Air Ambulance Service.

Last year, Tonbridge and Malling residents helped raise over £3,500 for this charity.

Once the festive season is over residents can compost their realChristmas trees by placing them in or next to their green-lidded bin.

They can also recycle cardboard, plain Christmas cards (no plastic or glitter) and all leftover food such as turkey bones and sprouts in their green-lidded bin.

Generally, any tree up to six feet in length and with a trunk up to three inches in diameter can be placed out whole for collection. Any tree longer or thicker than this should be cut up into smaller sections.

Christmas trees can also be taken to be recycled at one of the Household Waste Recycling Centres at Tovil (Maidstone), North Farm (Tunbridge Wells) and Sundridge (Sevenoaks), which are run by Kent County Council, or at Cuxton, run by Medway Council.

For a list of recycling banks visit: www.tmbc.gov.uk/waste.