A SQUAD of environmental crusaders will be knocking on doors to urge residents to recycle their rubbish.

The team of four will be touring areas where the Kerb-it recycling scheme is run, to encourage households to recycle their cans, glass and paper. They will also be working with schools to highlight the importance of recycling.

Kevin Loftus, Marion Ingleby, Nadia Wetherell and Claire Lamb will make up the team and will visit homes in Chester-le-Street, Durham, Sedgefield, South Tyneside, Gateshead and Sunderland in Smart cars.

The areas are all covered by the Kerb-it scheme, which involves providing residents with boxes in which cans, glass and paper can be stored and collected fortnightly.

Gary Whitehead, director of recycling at Premier Waste Management, which organised the scheme, said the average family throws away more than a tonne of waste every year, when much of it can be recycled.

The Government has passed the Household Waste Recycling Bill to make the household collection of two kinds of recycling materials law in the UK from 2010. Local authorities have been warned they must recycle nearly a quarter of their waste by April and 33 per cent by 2005.

Mr Whitehead said: "The aim of this law is to ensure that at least two types of waste are collected from homes and recycled.

"The councils that we are working with are now recycling at least three types of waste, so in the North-East we are ahead of the game."