£250k to go on ‘smart’ bins
MANCHESTER council will shell out more than £250,000 on solar-powered litter bins amid growing concerns about piled-up rubbish and dirty streets.
The town hall will spend just over £5,000 each on the new ‘smart’ bins for the city centre, which can take more rubbish and will automatically communicate to contractors when they are full. It had considered buying the high- tech equipment five years ago as part of a huge drive to clean up the city, but ultimately decided to spend £500,000 on traditional bins instead. Some of those will now be moved out of the city centre into other particularly busy areas of Manchester, while 51 solarpowered replacements will be ushered into the central shopping district.
The move, signed off at yesterday’s executive meeting, comes weeks after councillors lined up to slam the council’s bins contractor Biffa for allowing litter bins to overflow and streets to accumulate filth.
At a meeting last month, city centre councillor Joan Davies said she had been raising concerns for years, telling colleagues: “Some bins are being missed for days on end.” Councillors in other parts of Manchester made similar complaints. Old Moat member Gavin White referred to ‘sporadic’ collections, while residents submitted pictures of rubbish overflowing from public bins on streets and in parks.
The meeting heard Biffa currently have no system in place to tell them when bins are full.
Most of the £258,000 for new solarpowered bins – just over £200,000 – will come from borrowing, while the rest will come from reserves.
Coun Rabnawaz Akbar said: “This will make the best use of the latest technology to make sure that there is never any excuse for dropping litter on our streets.”