A war of words has broken out over kerbside recycling collection

delays across the area, with B&NES Conservatives accusing the Lib Dem administration of being ‘staggeringly inept’. The Lib Dems, in turn, have called the Conservatives ‘disgraceful’ for ‘attacking’ essential workers and claim that their ‘spin campaign’ is misleading.

The blow up came towards the end of last week, with residents experiencing a wait for recycling collections, due, say the Council, to a ‘recruitment crisis’ of LGV drivers.

The Conservatives urged the ruling Lib Dems to ‘get their act together’ and address the problem. They say other local authorities are coping with the recruitment issue and claim that last Wednesday and Thursday, the Council failed to collect waste from more than 330 locations.

The Tories also revealed that over the past twelve months, the administration has not had a single successful prosecution for fly-tipping, despite recording more than 3,000 separate incidents.

Other local authorities across the country have had recent successes with prosecuting fly-tippers. In April this year, East Herts Council prosecuted four people for fly-tipping, Hull City Council prosecuted nine and Durham County Council prosecuted two.

The Conservative Group insists that it is not good enough that B&NES has not managed to get a single prosecution in the past year, and is concerned that not enough is being done to tackle fly-tipping.

It was also revealed last month that the amount of waste from kerbside collections, HWRC deposits and trade waste that the Council sends for incineration has increased by 28% since 2018/19.

Cllr Vic Pritchard, Leader of the Conservative Group on B&NES Council, said: “This catalogue of failure when it comes to issues around waste and the environment is simply not good enough.

“It shows a staggering degree of ineptitude on

behalf of the Lib Dem administration, and I am hereby serving them with a notice that they must make improvements as quickly as possible.”

Councillor David Wood, Lib Dem Cabinet member for Neighbourhood Services, has hit back at “disgraceful” Conservative attacks on hard-working waste services staff. He said: “We know that missed collections are frustrating, but most residents recognise the challenges our crews face, and we want to thank them for their patience as services catch up.

“It’s worth noting that our staff carry out 135,000 refuse and recycling collections every week and have been collecting significantly increased tonnages of waste throughout lockdown periods. The vast majority of collections are completed on time and to high standards.

“The combination of the pandemic and Brexit has caused a recruitment crisis, particularly with regard to LGV drivers affecting the whole country. We are working to address the skills deficit by creating more training opportunities for drivers.

“Our waste crews have gone above and beyond to keep up with collections. They’ve been starting earlier and working extra shifts. We are incredibly grateful for their hard work. It’s frankly disgraceful that local Conservatives are attacking essential workers in this way and shows just how out of touch they are.

“Our waste collection services remain amongst the highest achieving in the country and at 60% recycling rates, it’s our best ever year.

“This spin campaign is also misleading. We have invested in fly-tipping enforcement and the number of people caught and fined has tripled since the start of our administration. Fly-tipping tonnages have reduced year on year.

“We all recall the Conservative solution to litter, which was to bring in a private company to stalk older residents and fine them for feeding the birds. The Lib Dems got rid of the privatised litter policing and we are focusing on protecting the services residents rely on.”