Council ‘buck passing’ ended in flat bins farce

Council admits ‘indefensible’ squabble should never happen

BUCK passing between council departments which resulted in bins not being returned to a block of flats has been branded “deeply frustrating”.

The Local Government and Social Care Ombudsman found fault with Birmingham City Council and said the problem was due to a “squabble” between two sections of the authority.

A resident last year complained bins had not been returned to the building’s collection point since the summer of 2020 and instead were left blocking the footpath and a bus stop.

The resident had struggled to return the bins to the storage area while the council initially refused to address the situation, the watchdog said.

It found the problem was due to a disagreement between the council’s housing and waste departments about who was responsible.

The council was reprimanded by the watchdog, with ombudsman Michael King stating £150 should be paid to the resident as compensation.

The case has now been picked up by the city council’s audit committee – and members this week grilled the city’s assistant director of street scene, Darren Share, about what had happened.

The flats at the centre of the row are in Staple Lodge Road, West Heath.

Committee chair Cllr Fred Grindrod (Lab, Bournville and Cotteridge) said: “This is not the service at all that we wish to give to the residents of the city.

“It is deeply frustrating when we as councillors approach a service expecting something to be dealt with and to be told it is not their issue and there is no effort whatsoever to pass it on to the other directorate.

“And indeed when problems like this emerge, it must be so much more frustrating for residents who are living very much in the middle of a failure of service.”

Cllr Marje Bridle (Lab, Glebe Farm & Tile Cross) said: “Departments have for such a long time been silos that have worked completely separately and have almost professional egos that really need destroying.

“Because if we are going to be an efficient, modern, effective council then this is a change that needs to happen.”

Cllr Sir Albert Bore (Lab, Ladywood) asked for an “unequivocal” assurance the situation had been resolved.

Mr Share, who has responsibility for waste management, said it had.

He said: “Historically there was a mixture of housing colleagues putting bins back and waste management teams putting bins back and that’s where the confusion started.

“No excuses – our team should have been putting the bins back. That’s now in place.

“We are monitoring the situation on a regular basis at Staple Lodge Road to make sure that doesn’t happen again.”

He says there are regular meetings “at all different levels across the service” to make sure there is a “much more joined up service between waste and housing”.

He added: “Horrible situation – completely wrong. I can’t defend the poor service that everybody got. We have learned from it and we have now actions in place to prevent this happening again.

“There has been a lot of buck passing in the past about who deals with what and ownership hasn’t been at the foremost.

“That is definitely changing and anything to do with waste now comes through us and we will deal with it.

“If that means the external services are spoken to, we will speak to them, we will get the work done and we will get back to the residents.”

The committee will write to chief executive Deborah Cadman to ask how a move towards “joined-up working” will be achieved.

Horrible situation – completely wrong. I can’t defend the poor service that everybody got. Assistant director of street scene Darren Share