A Burntwood councillor has accused a government minister of being “out of touch with reality” after proposals to reinstate weekly bin collections were dismissed.
Communities Secretary Eric Pickles has called for councils to scrap fortnightly rubbish collections.
However, a recent meeting of Lichfield District Council’s Strategic Scrutiny Committee were told that there was no going back on the issue.
And the leader of the council’s Labour group, Cllr Steve Norman, has accused Mr Pickles of simply trying to make good headlines rather than dealing with the reality facing local authorities.
He explained:
“Eric Pickles has tried to persuade councils to bring back weekly collections, even though costs would dramatically increase, ever since he got into government. In fact the number of councils changing to alternative weekly collections like Lichfield have increased rather than decreased since then.
“Almost half of English local authorities collect bins fortnightly for obvious reasons. While there is a case for increasing our brown bin (composting) waste weekly during the summer months, if residents wrap food up the problems with smells and so on should be minimal.
“All local authorities are having to cut millions of pounds from their budgets, including Lichfield District. The Minister makes good headlines in the Daily Mail but seems to be out of touch with reality.”
