Rubbish row: Café bins complaint sparks staffing crisis claims.

Owner forced to take rubbish to dump after council fails to make collections

AILEEN ROBERTSON A Fife café owner has moved to a private waste collection service after the council left bins piling up outside her premises.

Liz McTaggart, who runs McTaggarts in Aberdour, said she had no other option after she was forced to take the café’s waste to the dump herself, despite paying Fife Council £1,000 a year for uplifts.

Fife Council recently said a spate of vehicle breakdowns had led to a backlog in collections.

However, a whistleblower contacted The Courier with claims there were inadequate numbers of staff to maintain the bin collection service.

Mrs McTaggart said: “Our food bin wasn’t picked up for a fortnight.

“Our cardboard uplift was switched from Sunday to Wednesday and has never been picked up.

“I’ve been forced to take all our rubbish – food, cardboard, cans and plastics, and general rubbish, to the council dump.

“If they won’t come to me, I go to them.

It’s absolutely pathetic. We’re a café. We can’t leave food or other waste piling up on the street. CAFÉ OWNER LIZ MCTAGGART

“But we pay over £1,000 per year for this ‘service’.

“Phoning is a waste of time. It’s always someone different on the switchboard. They say they’ll pass on our situation but no one ever calls or collects.

“It’s absolutely pathetic. We’re a café. We can’t leave food or other refuse piling up on the street. We’re not renewing our contract and going to another provider.”

The Courier was contacted by a local refuse collector who claimed that lorries were going out with one driver and one person to load bins, when there should be two loaders.

He said the pressure on workers caused by operating with fewer staff had led to sickness absences.

“We used to be fully crewed up,” he said.

“There are quite a few off on the sick. The reason they are off on the sick is because we’re always going out with one driver and one loader, instead of two loaders.”

He added that recyclable material collected late was sent to landfill – a claim denied by the council.

Council service manager Martin Kingham said: “We have almost 200 staff working to provide a bin collection service across the kingdom.

“As with any large organisation, having to cover unplanned absences is reasonably common but we will always try to minimise any disruption to services.

“None of our crews are authorised to landfill recyclable materials unless their loads have been heavily contaminated, and that is very rare.”