A council-run recycling centre in Black Dam will close after "unacceptable" vandalism over the last year.

Cllr Hayley Eachus has announced that the recycling banks at Rucstall Community Centre in Holbein Close will be removed after being targeted by vandals and fly-tippers.

Cllr Eachus labelled it a "difficult decision" but said "the repeated damage has given us no choice". A glass bank was already removed in December after "irreparable damage".

The cabinet member for environment and enforcement said: "We have taken the difficult decision to close the recycling site at Rucstall Community Centre following ongoing antisocial behaviour and fly-tipping.

"Since last year we have seen the banks damaged through vandalism and fly-tipping dumped at the recycling site, which is also a car park for the community centre.

"This level of vandalism is totally unacceptable and, unfortunately, this is not the only recycling site in the borough targeted in this way.

“The repeated damage to the banks has given us no choice but to close the site.

"The bring banks will be removed and I’d like to remind local residents that they can recycle paper, card, cans, tins and glass at home in their green bins and glass boxes.

"Details of all the recycling sites, clothing banks and electrical banks in the borough are available on our website."

The site will close by May and the council say that the charities, which include the Salvation Army, Cystic Fibrosis and Ark Cancer Charity, have already been notified.

The site is one of 26 managed by the council across the borough and is not the first to be targeted by vandals in the past year. Incidents including fire damage and fly-tipping have also been reported at recycling sites including Kempshott and Stratton Park.

It comes after The Gazette reported how fly-tipping had increased by 60 per cent in the borough in the last year.

Statistics from the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) have showed that there were more than 4,000 fly-tipping incidents in the borough in 2019-20, a 63 per cent increase on the previous year.

Fly-tipping is now at an eight-year high in Basingstoke and Deane, having risen from 2,198 in 2012-13.

But the council says that the number of incidents "did not correlate" with the number reported by the public, and that its waste teams incorrectly recorded some incidents where householders left rubbish bags next to their grey bins.

You can read the full story here.