Weekly bin rounds get £250m boost

30 September 2011 Last updated at 04:39 ET

The government says it will make £250m available to help English councils keep or restore weekly bin collections.

Communities Secretary Eric Pickles told the BBC he believed it would make a “significant difference” and would help increase recycling.

He said local authorities which want the money would also have to show improvements in recycling, procurement and efficiency.

More than half of English councils run some form of fortnightly collection.

Many have invested in technology to operate alternate weekly schemes – in many areas the recycling is taken one week, general waste the next – and say fortnightly schemes encourage recycling and minimise expensive landfill taxes.

‘Significant difference’

But Mr Pickles called it a “basic right” for homes to have their rubbish taken away weekly.

Asked whether £250m was enough to make a noticeable difference, he told the BBC he believed it would make “a significant difference”.

The Weekly Collections Support Scheme is being funded by the Department of Communities and Local Government (DCLG) – no other budgets would be cut to pay for the scheme, it said.

Councils will be paid for guaranteeing to keep or reinstate weekly collections for at least five years, if they can demonstrate potential environmental benefits, such as increased recycling or reduced fly-tipping and litter.

Unveiling the plan ahead of the Conservative Party conference, which starts on Sunday, Mr Pickles said: “Weekly rubbish collections are the most visible of all front-line services and I believe every household in England has a basic right to have their rubbish collected every week.

“Our fund will help councils deliver weekly collections and in the process make it easier for families to go green and improve the local environment.”

Chairman of the Local Government Association Sir Merrick Cockell welcomed the news and told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme all councils would assess the efficiency of their rubbish collection and recycling schemes.

Sir Merrick is also the Conservative leader of London’s Kensington and Cha council, where he said all waste was collected twice a week.

“We find the money because that’s the need for our community,” he said. “Our residents can’t store refuse in their gardens because they don’t have gardens, they live in flats and so we have to collect it twice a week and that’s a decision we’ve made locally because it’s right for our community.”

‘Broken promises’

In 2008, Mr Pickles told the Conservative Party conference that weekly collections would “be back” if the party gained power.

But in June the government admitted it could not force councils to provide weekly collections – prompting criticism by Labour for “broken promises”.

Mr Pickles told the BBC on Friday the government was not trying to force councils to do anything – but wanted to remove the financial incentive to go to fortnightly collections.

At a time when the government is making large spending cuts, he was asked where the money had come from.

He said: “It’s not easy to find… clearly my department’s been cutting down a lot on waste and this money is coming out of my department.”

Under the proposals being outlined, local authorities could bid individually or in groups.

The DCLG said the funding would be additional to that given to councils in the local government financial settlement – there would be no other cuts to other budgets to pay for it, and it was “within the DCLG spending review envelope”.

One source said ministers had “raided every biscuit tin in the building” to find the cash.

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