Plastic, compostable or no bag? Choosing a food-waste caddy liner in England

Start with the liner section

Open your council’s household food-waste page and look for “liners”, “lining your caddy” or “bags”. If you live in a flat, check the instructions for your communal collection too. A nearby borough’s page, a supermarket label or a national article cannot settle what your own service accepts.

Write down three answers:

• Which materials may I use?
• Are any colours or bag types excluded?
• Can the food go in without a liner?

Look for any separate instructions about moving food from the kitchen caddy into the outdoor container. If the page only lists accepted foods, keep looking: that list may not contain the liner exception.

This matters because “no packaging” and “you can reuse a bread bag” can appear on the same page.

How a bread bag can be allowed when packaging is not

Reading’s guidance does exactly that. Its general exclusion covers packaging, while its dedicated liner section permits several reused bags. The practical distinction is the job the bag is doing: an expressly permitted bag holds the collected food; other wrappers and trays remain excluded. Read both sections together. Reading Borough Council’s food-waste guidance

For example, using an accepted bag to collect peelings does not give you permission to add a plastic food tray as another item. Nor does it mean all of the packaging around unwanted food can stay on. Empty the food out and follow your service’s separate instructions for that packaging.

National guidance makes a similar distinction between caddy liners holding food and other compostable or biodegradable packaging. That is why a compostable label on a cup or food container is not, by itself, an instruction to put it in the food bin. Defra’s household recycling guidance for England

Three local examples that lead to different choices

Reading: a reused bread bag is an option

Reading permits shopping, bread, cereal, crisp and salad bags as liners, along with newspaper and purchased liners. It excludes black bin bags and other food trays or packaging used as liners. Its page also lists libraries and leisure centres where residents can collect a roll, asking households to take one. Check the current locations and opening times before making a trip. Reading’s liner section

Croydon: use the specified compostable material, or no liner

Croydon says lining the kitchen caddy is optional. If you line it, use compostable material; newspaper is one option. For purchased food-waste liners it specifies 100% compostable bags certified to BS EN 13432:2000. “Biodegradable” alone does not meet the page’s requirement. An ordinary plastic bread bag is therefore not an option to borrow from Reading’s instructions. Croydon’s caddy-lining guidance

Hinckley & Bosworth: check the colour as well as the material

This service accepts compostable, plastic and paper liners, plus newspaper, but excludes black and dark-grey bags. It also permits no liner. Receiving a starter roll of compostable bags does not mean replacements must be compostable: the council explicitly allows other suitable bags, including reused ones. Hinckley & Bosworth’s liner FAQ

These pages had different update information when checked: Reading showed 27 October 2025; Hinckley & Bosworth showed 30 March 2026; Croydon’s page displayed no update date. Reopen the relevant page if your service sends new instructions.

Does the filled liner go out with the food?

Where your service accepts a liner for collection, it accompanies the food into the collection container. The national guidance expressly allows collection of caddy liners used to hold food waste. If your local instructions differ, or it is unclear whether a bag is approved for collection rather than just kitchen use, ask the collection service before relying on it. Defra guidance

Keep the liner question separate from how the waste is treated afterwards. Both Reading and Hinckley & Bosworth say liners, including compostable bags, are removed before food processing. A compostability claim on the packet does not tell you what happens at your local plant.

Before you buy another roll

Use this short decision sequence:

1. Your current bag is explicitly allowed: check the colour and any other exclusions before reusing it.
2. Only specified compostable liners are allowed: match the council’s stated certification, rather than choosing from the front-of-pack wording alone.
3. Going without a liner is permitted and suits you: there is no need to buy a bag just because the caddy originally arrived with one.
4. The instructions are unclear or conflict: give the service the bag’s material and colour and ask whether it is accepted as a filled food-caddy liner.

England’s Simpler Recycling guidance set 31 March 2026 as the default household change date, with transitional arrangements for some authorities. It does not establish one universal bag rule. The decision that matters at your kitchen counter is still the one in your collection service’s current instructions. Defra’s guidance and transitional arrangements