Yesterday, Leader of the South Gloucestershire Conservative Group, Cllr Liz Brennan wrote to the Leaders of the Lib Dem-Labour Administration who run South Gloucestershire Council regarding the waste collection chaos across South Gloucestershire.
Conservative Councillors have received persistent complaints from residents about missed bin collections, delayed pick-ups, and failures across recycling, food waste, and hygiene waste services.
These failures have raised serious public health concerns and damaged public confidence in the Council's ability to deliver a basic service that residents pay for through their council tax.
At a time when strong leadership is seriously needed, there is currently no Cabinet Member responsible for this service area due to the administration’s internal political problems.
Read Liz' full letter below:
Open Letter to South Gloucestershire Council
Subject: Urgent Action Required Following Ongoing Waste Collection Failures Across South Gloucestershire
Dear Cllr Tyrrell & Cllr Boulton
I am writing to you both today as currently, the Council is without an active Cabinet Member for the Place Department.
On behalf of the South Gloucestershire Conservative Group, I am raising the ongoing waste collection failures affecting residents across the district following the introduction of three-weekly black bin collections.
Since May, Conservative Councillors have been contacted relentlessly by residents reporting repeated missed collections, delayed pick-ups, overflowing bins, and recycling, food and nappy and human hygiene waste services.
The situation has been further worsened by periods of warm weather. Almost 20 separate communications have been issued by the Council regarding missed collections, delays, disruptions and contingency arrangements, highlighting the scale of the problems being experienced. As a result, many communities have been left with overflowing rubbish, accumulating nappy waste, unpleasant odours and increasing reports of vermin and animal infestation.
These failures have raised serious public health concerns and damaged public confidence in the Council's ability to deliver a basic service that residents pay for through their council tax. Residents are understandably asking why they should continue to pay for a service that is not being delivered and are rightly questioning whether compensation or council tax refunds should be considered where collections have repeatedly failed.
Adding to residents' frustration is the lack of accountability from the Liberal Democrat-Labour administration who run South Gloucestershire Council. At a time when strong leadership is seriously needed, there is currently no Cabinet Member responsible for this service area due to the administration’s internal political problems.
The Conservative Group is calling for urgent action to stabilise the waste collection service, clear existing backlogs, and provide residents with confidence that future collections will be completed reliably.
Yours Sincerely,
Liz Brennan
Leader of the South Gloucestershire Conservative Group
