With this week being Recycling Week, Staffordshire Moorlands District Council has thanked residents for helping the district achieve a recycling rate of over 56%.

The authority is now asking people to become 'Stay At Home Heroes' by recycling as much as they can from their waste around the house.

Examples of items that can be recycled include:

• Shampoo and shower gel bottles, toilet roll middles and tissue boxes and bathroom aerosols which go in the grey bin

• Food waste - this goes in brown bins either loose or in compostable bags with the EN13432 standard code and the seed logo

Councillor Sav Scalise, Cabinet Member for the Environment, said: "Thanks to the efforts of people across the Moorlands our recycling rates have reached 56.4%. This is a great achievement but we want to improve on it even more.

"We are all becoming increasingly aware of our impact on our environment and we can all contribute in a positive way by recycling more of our household waste. Recycle Week is the ideal time to renew our commitment to doing so.

"But it's important that we do it right - whilst many everyday items are recyclable we often find them in blue-lidded bins. There's a quick and easy guide to which items should go in which bins on our website so please take a look to see if you're throwing away items which you could recycle and let's get our rate up even higher!"

Items which can't be recycled in the grey bin include nappies, crisp packets and chocolate wrappers, plastic bags and film, black plastic items and containers with food or drink still in them.

These items will contaminate recycling loads and undo the good work of including items which can be accepted.

For more information, visit the council's website here.