Rubbish is rubbish

Not necessarily. Some recycled materials "cost" more to recycle in energy consumption, transportation etc than to mine/grow/manufacture from raw materials. I'm all for recycling where it makes environmental sense but to blindly assume that all recycling is good for the environment is a bit naive. Recycling is largely about "educating" people that there has to be a degree of inconvenience in disposing of unwanted items, which is why people are understandably resistant.