Fortnightly bin collections in Blaby

THOUSANDS of families across Blaby could see their bins being emptied every fortnight in a bid to cut costs.

The Conservative-run Blaby District Council wants to end weekly collections for both general rubbish and re-cycling and alternate them instead.

After five years of spending £2 million of Government funds on recycling the council is now looking at ways of saving costs.

In November 2012 the council was given £2 million of Government cash to carry out weekly refuse and recycling collections for five years.

It used the cash to buy five new cycling vehicles, extra bins and cover the £235,000 cost of running the service. That money runs out in April. The Conservative-run Leicestershire County Council has also withdrawn the payments of recycling credits depriving the district of more than £500,000 a year.

But civic chiefs voted to carry out a £110,000 consultation on the changes while Labour and Liberal Democrat members abstained on the vote.

A Blaby council spokesman said: “In order to achieve the magnitude of the savings required within the refuse and recycling service, the council needs to reduce the number of vehicles and staff used to carry out the refuse and recycling in day to day operations.

“Therefore it is recommended to consult on the basis that the current weekly refuse and recycling service will change from its current configuration to one of an alternate weekly basis.

“This means that one week refuse will be collected and the alternate week the recycling will be collected.”

The council has warned of job losses but says it does not know how many posts will be lost at this stage.

There are concerns that large households will see their bins overflowing with rubbish because it will only be taken away once a fortnight.

However officials say they have examined a sample of 6,000 homes in the district and 23 per cent of them used less than half of their recycling and refuse bins.

However Labour councillor Shabbir Aslam said: “I have con- cerns about this survey. Which area did they look at? Did they mainly look at areas where pensioners live because they would produce less waste than a large family.

“I have concerns about its reliability.

“Families will want to know if they will get bigger bins and if they will have to pay more for them. “It’s not good.” Lib Dem councillor Geoff Walsh said: “The council’s in a tough position created entirely by the Tories. The Government money is ending and Conservatives at County Hall have stopped the recycling credits.

“What I do know is that the Blaby public think the current waste collection system is super.

“People won’t be happy that is being effectively halved.”

The council says it has made staff and trade unions aware of the proposed changes.

It has warned of redundancies but not, at this stage, said how many posts are at risk.

Details of the consultation are due to be announced in the near future.