A campaign to get Leeds’ residents recycling more glass is drawing inspiration from public information films commissioned in World War II under Winston Churchill’s leadership.
The film It All Adds Up, produced for Leeds City Council by Leeds Beckett University’s Dr Henry Irving and a graduate of LBU’s Northern Film School, draws inspiration from the wartime era to emphasise the importance of recycling.
Short films formed a key part of the wartime campaign, working to boost public morale and appeal to a sense of patriotism and duty. The Leeds Beckett University (LBU) film uses similar techniques, snatches of archive footage, and a wartime-inspired strapline – ‘It All Adds Up” - to inspire a sense of responsibility towards the environment today.
Dr. Henry Irving, who led on the project, is a Senior Lecturer in Public History at Leeds Beckett University and a specialist in 20th-century British history. His extensive research into the Second World War's public information campaigns, particularly around recycling—known then as "salvage"—informed the film's innovative approach. During the war, recycling was vital due to shortages of essential raw materials. This shortage led Churchill’s government to implement emergency legislation mandating the collection of paper, metal, textiles, and even household bones for reuse.
Dr Henry Irving, Senior Lecturer in Public History at Leeds Beckett University said: “Since wartime recycling or ‘salvage’ was a new experience for most people, the government carried out a huge publicity campaign around its importance, and the wartime films were particularly powerful tools.
“My research shows that wartime films were powerful tools and their messages hit home, with wartime surveys showing dramatic falls in the amount of recyclable material that was thrown away. By revisiting these same ideas today, we aim to connect with audiences on an emotional level and encourage them to see recycling as a way to meet the big challenges we face today”
Leeds City Council’s recent move to include glass in household recycling falls under a national policy called ‘Simpler Recycling’, where many councils in England are now making changes to their waste management practices. The scheme requires councils to consider options that require the fewest number of different bins for households and allow as many materials as possible to go in the same recycle bin.
Before this change, approximately just half of every household’s 260 glass bottles and jars each year were making it to the correct recycling point. This meant that 11,400 tonnes of glass was burnt to produce energy when it could have been put back into glass production. Leeds City Council’s new glass collecting campaign is expected to have a significant impact, potentially diverting thousands of tonnes of glass from waste each year – an essential step in the fight against the climate emergency.
The film is currently being featured across Leeds City Council’s social media platforms and on the Millennium Square big screen as part of a broader campaign to increase public awareness and participation in glass recycling.
The project was funded by the British Academy as part of an Innovation Fellowship designed to mobilise arts and humanities research to tackle contemporary challenges.
Watch the short film ‘It All Adds Up’ on YouTube: https://youtu.be/QAFrNsaLqQY?si=GXNV-Uc6fcdSu9b2