Differing views on first week of alternate weekly collections

Green Wheelie Bin

Alternate weekly bin collections began in Rochdale this week. The change in service has meant that non-recyclable waste, which must be sent for landfill, is collected on one week and then recyclable waste is collected the next. The policy involves using two bins, one for each type of waste, which will be collected on alternate weeks.

However, according to councillor for West Heywood Alan McCarthy things did not exactly go to plan in his ward. He said: “Day one of the rollout of the fortnightly bin collection has seen alarming numbers of Heywood residents totally omitted from the scheme and others delivered with calendars that were meant for Rochdale and instructed them to put the wrong bin out. Driving around my ward visual indications were that this could be as high as 30%.”

Councillor Wera Hobhouse, cabinet member for the environment, responded with an apology to the people of the West Heywood ward that had had a negative experience during the first week of collections. She said: “200 households in Hopwood Ward (out of an estimated 11,000 households across Heywood) were delivered an incorrect calendar, which put their first week of recycling to next week. This was obviously a mistake and I apologise on behalf of the Environmental Management Department for the confusion to all those households.

“However, all waste has been collected from those properties and correct calendars delivered. The crews will continue to collect all waste from those properties until a proper routine has been established.”

Councillor McCarthy has said there has been a large increase in the number of elderly and disabled people who wish to go on the assisted bin collection scheme because they believe that in future they will not be able to handle their full bins.

Councillor Hobhouse said in reply: “All people who have a genuine need for assisted collections are entitled to this service and will receive it independent from the introduction of Alternate Weekly Collections.

“Assisted collections are not a service that will allow some residents to get out of the new Alternate Weekly Collection scheme. It is a service for people who genuinely need physical assistance with taking their waste from their houses to the kerbside, whether it is landfill or recyclable waste and they need to demonstrate that they can't do this themselves.

Mr McCarthy claimed that he had received complaints that some brown garden waste bins in the area had not been emptied for eight weeks. Wera Hobhouse said that whilst it is unfortunate that some brown bins had not been collected for such a long period, this had nothing to do with the Alternate Weekly Collections scheme.

Mr McCarthy concluded by saying: “I am concerned that residents omitted from the scheme have already full bins and these are not due to be emptied until next week and with the possibility that these will not be emptied if bin lids are up, which is the present policy.”

Mrs Hobhouse said: “Residents who 'can't cope' with the new system and find that they have more landfill waste than we collect every two weeks  will receive a so called 'bin audit'. A Council officer will come to the household, go through all the issues with the resident and give special advice on how to reduce landfill in each individual case. This service has been particularly successful in the Pennines Township and helped everybody who struggled at first.”

Contrary to Councillor McCarthy’s beliefs, speaking yesterday, she finished by saying: “Early indications show that people in Heywood have done extremely well and we collected an impressive amount of recyclable waste on this first week. Going around Heywood today [Thursday 15 June] I saw no evidence of chaos, uncollected waste left in the streets or hundreds of 'wrong bins' being left un-emptied on the kerbsides.

“We will of course monitor the situation very carefully and continue to review the scheme where necessary.”