Bolton Hospice is set to benefit from a scheme which recycles used computer cartridges.

Businessman Nick Brough, who is the Lasertech franchisee in Bolton and Wigan, also hopes the programme will help raise environmental awareness in the area.

The company is to provide Bolton businesses, shops and schools with collection bins to save their used toner and ink cartridges.

When the bins are full, the company arranges a free collection and pays for the empty cartridges.

Customers then have the option to either donate a percentage of the money to the Bolton Hospice, save money for their business or receive the full value in high street shopping vouchers.

Money donated to the Bolton Hospice will help it raise the £1 million-plus it needs each year.

Lasertech's programme is designed to cut the amount of waste plastic and metal ending up in UK landfill sites.

Mr Brough said the used cartridges would be recycled at Lasertech's head office in Warrington.

He said: "If the outer case of the toner cartridge is in good condition then it will be re-used as a shell for a new manufactured printer toner cartridge.

"All the internal components of the cartridges will be turned back into their base form."

Mr Brough, aged 42, who lives in Warrington, went into recycling -- and joined Lasertech -- after being made redundant from his job as a telecommunications engineer.

Lasertech was established in Warrington in 1989 by Jason Williams with the help of a £1,000 grant from the Prince's Trust. It has since gone national with 17 franchise areas.

The company said that only 25 per cent of the seven million printer toner cartridges used in the UK each year are currently recycled.