BASINGSTOKE has already hit the recycling target it was set to achieve by the end of next year.

Cllr George Hood, Cabinet member for community well-being, told the latest council meeting: "We are now achieving a 17.4 per cent recycling rate with our roadside collection from bins.

"When we add to that our glass from bottle banks and collections of clothing, we are already achieving the 20 per cent recycling of rubbish that we hoped to achieve by the end of 2003."

Cllr Hood said that since 1998 the council had collected and crushed 2,525 cars from the borough's streets.

Nearly 1,000 had been crushed since the borough got its own crusher last year.

Cllr Hood also updated council members on air monitoring in the borough.

Monitors have been put in place around the site of the new incinerator being built at Chineham so that experts can check the readings before and after the incinerator starts operating and compare the difference.