to be a bit pissed off that after all the cuts, £250,000,000 has been 'found' for weekly bin collections?

[Annpan88]

Correct me if I'm wrong but after all these cuts to services and people losing their jobs, I believe the government has decided to make changes to the minor Inconvenience that is fornightly bin collections?

Yes, it is a bit of a pain in the arse but I don't see how its the most important thing in thw world and I'm guessing people are pretty use to it.

I just wonder if people are feeling like me, AIBU?

Lets go back to the "Winter of Discontent" in the late 1970's, when the country was in a shambles under the Callaghan administration, with the Trade Unions calling the shots.
Litter piling up on the streets, epidemics of rats and bodies not being buried.

Not a 'minor Inconvenience' but a health hazard that the councils should be paying for. They take council tax and then whine "but we can't spare any money!" and so we now have to pay them TWICE to get it done.

Sorry, SardineQueen!

Hey boulevard...

JINX!!!!!!

BTW am not saying that all drug addicts are thieves, by a long chalk. But statistically, if you get robbed, the person who did it is likely to be doing it to feed an addiction. So treating drug addicts is a boon not just for them but for the wider communities, their families, the police etc etc and so on.

nogreythatmatters wheelybins are terribly good you know, rats can't get in them at all.

Certainly in areas where you can't have wheelybins a more regular collection is necessary (and that happens at the moment).

"Lets go back to the "Winter of Discontent" in the late 1970's...
Litter piling up on the streets, epidemics of rats and bodies not being buried."

I find my wheeliebin will comfortably hold 2 or even 3 bodies if I chop them up carefully. How many are you disposing of?

drug users in programs that give tem access to drug substitutes are less likely to rob to fund illegal drug use - and less like to do other things like die ... silly use of money - far better to have you half full bin seen too

People MUST get used to throwing out less for the sake of the environment.

That's right. Take the wrapping off of something you bought and hide it under the bed like sensible people do.

Generating rubbish is not a matter of choice for most people.

It is ridiculous and pandering to lazy people who have their head in the sand about the waste crisis. We have had fortnightly collections (well alternating ones which amounts to the same thing) for years now with no issue at all. All the problems raised here like too many bins or vermin, can be got around with appropriate containers and in fact are not problems for other areas. Our council manages to collect plastics, cardboard, the lot. They manage to offer us a choice of bins.

The cost of sending stuff to landfill is increasing at such a rate we will just have to get used to consuming/wasting less AND putting more effort into recycling, or don't complain when the council tax keeps going up. By 2020 the amount going to landfill is supposed to be only a third of 1995 levels (ie. when hardly anything got recycled) - that will take some serious effort.

I get annoyed now by unrecyclable things. Jiffy bags, for example. Polystyrene. Stupid overpackaging.

x posted but sorry, I think generating rubbish IS to some extent a matter of choice. You have to think a long way ahead though about what you buy and how it's packaged/ how you get rid of it.

I think a lot of the rats/foxes issues could be a lot more quickly solved with better bins/boxes/tougher bags.

In the height of summer a smelly bin bag will get ripped open within days, 2 weeks versus 1 makes no difference, whereas a different type of bag/box/bin probably would.

slavetofilofax, sorry snort at 'traipsed through the garage' - you don't sound too pushed for space really, and that sounds like back to front access!

Increasing frequency of landfill waste collections is bad - everyone should be cutting their landfill waste. We (family of four) regularly take 4-6 weeks to fill our black wheelie bin, similar for recycling wheelie. I was expecting further cuts in collection frequency as we all take on board the need for environmental awareness, as well as tighten our belts in this recession...it just doesn't make sense.

Yes that's true laweasel.

The ideas about stinks and vermin are based on the old system, wheelie bins are pretty good. Although they can honk when you open them esp if you eat a lot of shellfish and have a baby in nappies

How much food waste are some of you producing? .
Okay, we compost except when I give it to my friends for their guinea pigs (some things excepted). Still, even if I include
all the vegie peelings
all the banana peels, apple cores, avocado stones
all the egg shells
all the breadcrumbs and a few unloved sandwiches, biscuit crumbs
excess sausage fat
toilet paper rolls (compostable)
Odd bits of paper that can be composted
The odd chicken carcass

I still don't think our family of six would produce more than... what.... 2 bread bag fulls per week? So about a carrier bag's worth per fortnight. Is that really such a health hazard? Or are lots of you throwing out perfectly good quality food?

yanbu, btw.

What I find funny is that this has clearly been done to please certain people and win their votes, yet surely they are the people who are always going to vote Tory anyway and everyone else seems to think this is stupid. The majority on here are clearly against it and on the news everyone they interviewed weren't in the slightest bit bothered about fortnightly collections.

Completely ridiculous, and as I am getting almost tired of saying - this is what happens when you elect a Conservative government

The other thing is that people who vote tory are more likely to have larger houses and gardens - so room for all the wheelie bins and a compost heap and all that sort of malarky.

The whole thing's silly.

Totally agree!

Not only wasteful but wrong, wrong wrong! We need to produce less waste. Once people realise they can no longer chuck everything away they will reuse and recycle more, but more importantly vote with their purses and avoid overpackaged products - manufacturers therefore being forced to rethink.

Fucking furious about this! We live in a 5-person family, not to mention 2 cats and dog and one pet rodent! We cope with fortnightly refuse collections just fine. I can see thje problem maybe with flat and houses where there is no room for storage of rubbish, but that isn't the majority of homes.

Why is it a priority?

YANBU. The two-weekly cycle works beautifully here - black bin and paper/card recycling box one week, brown garden bin, glass/tins/plastic recycling box the other week. ( If they did add a small food recycling bin, maybe that would be better weekly - but TBH between our own composting and dog, we have hardly any food waste to bin.)

Either I'd have to put all these bins out every week - which combined with the neighbours would block the street - or they'd have to scrap some of the recycling, presumably the brown bin which is wonderful. How the hell is that supposed to be an improvement?

Bloody stupid misguided idea to return to weekly if your council has got biweekly properly sussed.

There are so many more useful things this money could be spent on!

Eric pickles is my least favourite Tory and that's saying something!

Apparently it is a right to have a weekly collection

The man us obsessed with fucking bins. He abolished the whole audit commission because they recommended that his local council had fortnightly collections. After that he had a personal vendetta against the audit commission and said that it have him personal pleasure to abolish it

And he needs to work out the difference between refuse and refuge.

I detest him and everything he stands for

BTW our wheelie bin isn't stuffed full every fortnight.
Our 2 recycling boxes aren't usually overflowing.
The food bin is, I am ashamed to admit but atm that is because of my mother and her constant donation of slug-eaten veg most of which has to be composted. And we dont have our own compost bin atm.

On the nappy question, I've always thought it would be good if local authorities could offer a subsidised nappy laundry service to those who are interested, funded through the savings made by less frequent bin collections!

And lower landfill costs.

This thread has prompted me to email my council to tell them to please ignore this nonsense and thank them for their excellent service.

YANBU, but unfortunately fortnightly bin collections only work if you have considerate neighbours. I only manage to fill half a bin every couple of weeks, but some of my neighbours create unbelievable amounts of rubbish. I really don't know how they do it. As I live in a street of tiny terraced houses, unfortunately on hot days it's rare that we can open our windows because of the fly problem caused by over filled stinking bins.

OI! PICKLES stuff your stupid idea
we in Southampton have not had regular bin collections since April
sort that out before you start micromanaging how other councils do their job.
Localism my arse