Belmont North has become the latest suburb to receive a reverse vending machine in the Return and Earn scheme

Mr MacDonald believes the Return and Earn scheme has been crucial in cleaning up NSW, and said the reverse vending machines are “the largest litter reduction initiative to be introduced in NSW”.

“Now the Belmont community can get involved,” he said.

“The NSW Government is committed to the Return and Earn scheme and further reverse vending machines and other collection months will be developed across the Hunter in the coming months.

“It is unfortunate that the Labor Party has been so negative about the scheme considering they failed to implement their own container deposit scheme.”

NSW Environment Minister Gabrielle Upton was also pleased the initiative was continuing to expand, and revealed “there has been widespread community support for Return and Earn”.

“Over 152 million containers [have been] returned across the state since December 1, 2017,” Ms Upton said.

More than 11 million containers – mostly including containers between 150ml and three litres – have been returned in the Hunter since the beginning of the scheme.

The Coles Jewellstown Plaza Return and Earn vending machine will be open seven days a week from 7am to 10pm, and will have a maximum limit of 500 bottles per transaction.

Returned containers should be intact, not crushed or broken ,and should have a readable barcode to be eligible.