LARGE families who might struggle with South Gloucestershire’s move to three-weekly black bin collections can apply for a second wheelie bin, council leaders say.
The reduction from fortnightly kerbside collections of non-recyclable rubbish is being accompanied by a rollout of new reusable white recycling bags for plastic, cans and foil, rolls of smaller blue bags for soft plastic, and a nappy and hygiene waste collection.
Council leaders have admitted making mistakes during the transition to a new waste contract seven months ago, which included changes to collection days.
At a council scrutiny commission meeting in March, Paul Hughes (Con, Bitton & Oldland Common) asked if the authority had “modelled the impact on vulnerable residents and larger households” of the change to three-weekly black bin collections.
Cabinet member for communities Sean Rhodes (Lab, Kingswood) said: “Any household that is struggling to manage with the move to three-weekly, even once they’ve taken on the recycling, there is the capacity for applying for an additional black bin.
“They will be assessed on that, and as long as all of the appropriate levels of recycling and sorting are happening, the option of getting an additional black bin is available to people, as long as they apply through the website.”
As part of the new £120 million, eight-year waste contract, the council has taken over waste transfer stations and Sort It household waste recycling centres.
Kerbside collections continue to be outsourced to Suez, which held the previous long-term deal.
The new contract has seen more than 50 Suez staff transfer to the council and more than half of all bin lorries replaced.
Cllr Rhodes said: “I genuinely cannot overstate the amount of work that has gone into delivering transformational change to a service which connects to almost every single one of our residents.”
A report to the scrutiny commission said not everyone was aware their bin day had changed when the new contract started last August, despite the authority sending two separate leaflets to every household, as well as social media posts, adverts, and information in One Stop Shops and libraries.
Asked by Cllr Hughes if the council “could have done more”, Cllr Rhodes said: “The ideal way of doing it would be 1-2-1 to every household, and knock on every single door to let people know, but obviously that’s not going to happen.
“The simple answer to your question is yes, there are always lessons we can learn to get our comms better.
“Overall a good job was done in terms of getting that information out.
“A considerable change happened.
“Could we have done more? Always, we could do more, absolutely.”
Replying to a question by Brenda Langley (Con, Hanham) about collection delays on New Year’s Eve, Cllr Rhodes said high levels of staff sickness, combined with an “unprecedented” rise in cardboard from home deliveries, meant extra rounds could not be made.
He said: “Maybe we should have had a better handle on that, but it was at a level that we genuinely didn’t expect.”
By Adam Postans, Local Democracy Reporting Service