Discussion on:

Devices worth millions discarded by Britons each year

Recycling these gadgets can lead to even more problems.
How?
Like this: in my country there was made a law some years ago which requires everyone to return old or faulty electrical gadgets either to a shop or to a special collecting place "for recycling". What was so very strange with this was that it was the importers of such gadgets that were behind this law.
Why?
By doing this they effectively removed ALL used parts from the market, forcing consumers to either buy a new sparepart for high prices, or buy a completely new gadget instead.
But surely many of these gadgets can be repaired and sold again?
No, that was the whole point of this law. Not only are You forbidden to ask for, take or buy any of these broken gadgets and try to repair them (usually there is only a broken fuse or some similar simple fault), but the consortium that takes care of the recycling has the power to allow or reject a company from taking part in the "recycling" scam. Over 95% of the companies that used to live on repairing electronics are now out of business. Not only that; our export-import balance has become completely tilted, and we have a massive foreign debt now. Not that it concerns this recycling consortium in any way, because they get their money both from the consumers who are forced to pay a recycling fee (by law) for every new gadget, and also from the importers, who have never been so well off before. Unfortunately, we have nothing to export to compensate for that, so our taxes are rising like crazy.

So, if a similar scam if being planned in Your country right now, be on Your guard. Demand that repairing of gadgets is allowed, by whomever wants to repair. Otherwise it will take about six years for Your country's economy to be ruined too. Unfortunately I can't tell You which country this is because there may be repercussions, but it is a western european country.

Yes, What you say makes sense to me but it won't to our leaders. It's not that bad here but it's started to happen.

Here in India there is practically nothing that is not repaired. If the exercise is not cost effective for the end user he/she has the option of selling to a junk dealer who will completely dismantle the device and retrieve everything they can,

Even 20 year old monochrome CRT monitors have a value& use !

Well anyone in the UK who is sending electrical waste to the landfill is actually breaking the law - there has been electrical recycling legislation in effect for about the last 4-5 years - The Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEE :-)).

Poeple just need to get off their lazy fat arses and take the stuff down the local council dump/recycle centre where they will take it off your hands, for free too.

On the negative side, some local councils have just been stuffing a container and shipping it to some ****-hole in Africa to get rid of it, though they are being found out and jailed.

Why throw things away when you can give them away through Freegle (http://ilovefreegle.org/). You don't even need to take things to the tip - people come and collect them from you.