The inspections are being carried out by staff from consultants EC Sustainable Development as part of a random audit of bins required by the EPA.

Shoalhaven City Council’s waste services manager David Hojem said the EPA required assessments of rubbish bin contents to be carried out each year.

While council was planning just a minor review this year ahead of a major one in 2013, it still required random inspections of rubbish and recycling bins.

“We’re not trying to intrude on anyone’s privacy, but it’s something that needs to be done as part of planning for future waste services,” Mr Hojem said.

He said leaflets would be placed in letterboxes before an area was targeted for inspection, giving people a chance to opt out if they did not want their bins checked.

However long-serving Shoalhaven City Councillor Greg Watson said a lot of people would be horrified at the prospect of having someone sift through the contents of their rubbish bins.

Meanwhile weekly kerbside collections of recyclable material during the first few weeks of the year proved to be a great success, according to Mr Hojem.

During four weeks from Christmas through to Australia Day council switched its kerbside collection of recyclables from fortnightly to weekly, but despite the collections being more frequent each week brought large volumes of recyclable material.

Mr Hojem said the average volume of recycles collected during the four weeks was up 37 per cent on the average during other weeks of the year.

At the same time the volume of non-recyclable material collected was up 24 per cent, he added.

On top of the increased collection, council had received many telephone calls from people thanking staff for the extra collections during a busy time of the year.