to think reducing general waste collections to every 3 weeks is unrealistic?

[HazelMember]

The council has reduced general waste collections to once every 3 weeks instead of twice a month. The general waste wheelie bin is already half the size of a normal bin.

I already recycle as much as possible. Cardboard plastics food waste glass tins everything. I am genuinely trying to do the right thing environmentally. But even with all that the general waste still builds up especially with a family.

Three weeks feels like a long time to store rubbish. I keep seeing just recycle more as the answer but I am already doing that. There is not much left to recycle.

How are people actually managing this? Are you just producing less waste somehow or are your bins overflowing too?

AIBU to think this change does not reflect how households actually live?

Me too. I can often go 6 weeks before my general waste wheelie bin needs to go out.

My local Sainsbury’s will accept “soft plastics”
waste. My recycling centre is 4 miles away so that’s helpful too.

It’s probably what the council wants. Rubbish will no longer be their problem and they will still charge us the same for our council tax and more when it inevitably goes up every year!

Whatever are you putting in there?

We are every other week and had a huge increase in flies and maggots last summer which we finally traced to the garbage. Every third week would be a disaster I think

Same here . Until food suppliers change their packaging there’s no hygienic way to reduce it .

My council does a medical waste wheelie bin. Think you might have to pay for it upfront but they do collect it more regularly. Not sure how often but next door has one and it’s always out and collected

does your council do something similar?

All councils are going to be forced to do weekly waste food collections soon.

We pay nearly £70 for a brown/garden waste bin which accepts food waste - which is emptied every couple of weeks (except in winter), so for 24 collections.

We've renewed for this year, but I think it's the last time they're going to have extra money for doing their actual job.

Most food packaging is recyclable

Ours is once a month. The biggest family on the lane just uses the bins that technically belong to an empty house.

To be honest, the most annoying thing about the bin system is that the recycling boxes all dramatically collapse and fall into each other when you're rattling your way up the lane with the trolley that they stand on...

Oh, and food bins never get collected, so we have all given up on that. Mine was used as a spare planter for a while.

Yes, it's a terrible idea. Not only because some people DO struggle and would have to much in the bin (at the end of the 3 weeks) but also, the SMELL in summer would be unholy! 💀

Our bin stinks like hell by the end of the 2 weeks in the 3 months of summer, and we have to move it as far away from the back door and windows as we can.

We move it near to the neighbour's fence at the bottom (about 10-15 feet from their kitchen window...!) The neighbour who runs along the bottom of our garden, not next door.

I don't care if they can smell it, they smoke (cigarettes) so we have to put up with that stink every fucking day outside between April and October, (as they 'work' from home, so are always in, and spend quite a lot of time outside in the warmer months....!) 🙄 And they smoke cannibis at least 3 times a day, so we have to put up with that vile stench wafting up the garden too! (Again, especially in those April to October months....) So they can smell our rank, foul, smelly bin. Only fair. 😎

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It's a piss take considering the amount of council tax we all pay. The councils should concentrate on bin services that we all use and reduce other services that are less necessary. Not to mention reducing the gold-plated pensions for all their staff.

The only time we get close to filling ours (family of 5, reduced size wheelie bin, no nappies) is if we're eating lots of junk food or take aways. Or having a declutter.

Ours also emptied every 3 weeks. Only full on occasion. Where do you think all the black bins are going? It's landfill or incinerator. Which nobody wants to live next door to these. So less waste required. Reducing how easy it is to get rid of waste is one way to do that.

That was the comment I was going to make, people shouldn’t have to use their time and petrol going to a recycling centre when refuse collection is a service which they’re paying for as part of their council tax.

Ours is every two weeks, we sometimes go a month (by accident mostly!) and it STINKS! There’s a lot in our house though!

Absolutely.. same as people shouldn’t have to pay for private healthcare because they can’t see a GP.
It makes you wonder what things will be like here in 10 years.

Be like that for a couple of years here and it's hell. Near by tip is our saviour. We recycle etc.

Out of curiosity. What are you voting for?

Ability to throw away as much as you like?

Would you also be happy to pay the additional council tax required to deal with the waste?

Are you happy for the local playing field to be turned into landfill?

And an incinerator plant built on the waste ground 0.5 miles away?

Your road to be the waste lorry route to and fro?

Seriously people. Unless your council has minimal recycling options, please have a look at what you're throwing away. It's really not hard to deal with.

(Caveat- I am aware that people in flats, limited bins storage etc find multiple bins difficult)

Mines every 3 weeks. It's a nightmare, has been this way for years

Ours in monthly. Its a nightmare if you forget! They will take extra bin bags left at the side of the bin usually though. Don’t need to do that very often though

@MadisonAvenue

people shouldn’t have to use their time and petrol going to a recycling centre when refuse collection is a service which they’re paying for as part of their council tax.

100% agree!

Also, we pay full council tax, and STILL have to pay for the green waste to be collected. 🙄 I mean, really?! Our council tax is almost £2.5K a year, and the feckers want an extra £60 to empty the green bin! (Not the bottles/cardboard/tins etc, the green bin itself!) Surely, this should be included in the bloody £2.5K?!!! I mean it's only £60 but it's a piss take.

If you choose to not subscribe, and are 'caught' putting stuff like dead flowers, grass cuttings, hedge trimmings and the like in the general waste bin, (or if they see it in there) they will NOT empty your general waste. 😕

Some people have great areas with food compost recycling and such so their general waste is minimal. I know DH’s Grandad also recycles things like crisp and biscuit packets at the supermarket. Plus obviously some people are on their own so will have minimal rubbish.

We’re a family of 7 so we’d have no hope going 3 weeks between, it’s bad enough being 2.

Are you just producing less waste somehow

Yes. There are only two of us most of the time so we have, at most, three bags of waste in our grey bin after a fortnight, so we could easily go to a three weely collection. Everything else goes in the recycing bins (blue - cardboard and paper; brown - plastic, tetrapaks, cans, glass; green - garden waste). We also have a compost bin in our garden. Our council doesn't offer food waste bins, not that we produce very much.

It depends on how many people there are in your house and your lifestyle. We don't have babies or dogs and I no longer need san pro, although I struggle to understand why a single person can fill a landfill bin so fast.

This was an average week's waste (on the left - approx 300g) and recycling (on the right), for our family when we were still on weekly collections (2 adults, 2 teenagers, 1 cat). The best tip to reduce waste is simply to look in your bin, see what generates the most waste and buy a lower / no packaging alternative. Lots of small changes over several months make a huge difference to the quantity produced.

I thought the same as you OP until our council made the change. It's doable! And I have a baby in nappies! The bin is full every time but it's working! And like you, recycling everything I can - helps that those bins are still once a fortnight, weekly for food waste (also full to the brim but yet to have a problem!). It's been about 10 months now, you get used to it .

We have been on every three weeks for years. Family of 6. Never had to go to the recycling centre. Food and recycling emptied every week. I think about how much waste I’d be creating when shopping and looking at packaging. We need to be throwing less away, less landfill for the sake of our kids and grandkids