Frustrated Aussies have started leaving harshly worded messages on their recycling bins to deter people from taking bottles and cans from inside.
Several bins were spotted with blunt messages scrawled on their lids, as locals vented their anger.
One fed-up homeowner wrote, ‘keep your hands off my f***ing bins,’ while another demanded, ‘stop scabbing through my bins’.
The handwritten notes, shared online, ignited a heated debate on social media.
Some were outraged by the behaviour, while others sympathised, acknowledging the challenges of the cost of living crisis.
‘It should be banned. I get people are finding it hard but it’s getting out of control,’ one person wrote.
Another said it was ‘pretty low going through someone else’s bins’.
Others called out the rude notes and labelled the messages ‘nasty’.
Locals didn’t hold back in expressing their frustration, with the strongly worded messages spotted on the lids of several bins (pictured)
‘So long as they are not hurting you or the bin or making a mess, what harm does it do,’ one woman wrote.
Most states and territories across Australia introduced bottle and container deposit schemes to stop people littering in an effort to keep rubbish off the streets.
Reusable waste that are deposited at recycling return points allows people to earn 10 cents per item.
Some items such as wine and spirit bottles and cordial containers will not be accepted.
Under the NSW government’s Return and Earn program, which was introduced in 2017, more than a billion dollars worth of refunds have been issued so far.
Rummaging through waste inside recycling rubbish bins is illegal in some jurisdictions across Australia.
Anyone caught taking waste from bins in the town of Wodonga, in Victoria’s north, can be fined $180 under council laws.
Meanwhile, Redland City Council, in Brisbane’s south east, has banned people from going through waste disposed in residential recycle bins.
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