Mon Nov 21, 2016 4:22 am
The council say food waste could be put in garden waste bins on alternate weeks as part of a "redesign" of waste collection
Household waste bins will only be collected every other week if council cost saving plans are approved.
Coventry council budget proposals released today also show residents can expect to be hit with a four per cent increase to the authority’s chunk of the overall council tax bill as they target £36million of further savings by 2020.
The council is also proposing hundreds of job losses, changes to bin collections, potential increases to car parking charges and possible future reductions in council tax support for the city’s poorest residents.
An eight week public consultation into the proposed cuts is set to begin before the end of the year.
Here, in part one of our budget analysis, we take a look at how the changes will hit the city’s services:
Bin collectionsThe council is set to “redesign” bin collections in a bid to save £1m a year.
Green household waste bins would only be collected every other week under the proposals. They are currently collected every week.
However, fortnightly brown lidded garden waste bin collection would run all year round under the new system - on alternate weekends to the household bin collections.
Residents would be allowed to put food waste in the garden waste bins on weeks when household waste is not collected.
There would be no change to the blue lidded fortnightly bin collections.
Coun John Mutton, the council's cabinet member for finance, said: “Residents will still be able to dispose of their food waste every week, either in the green bin or in the brown bins.”
Car parkingA full review of car parking in the city is underway as the council looks to increase the profit made in this area.
The council is looking to reduce the number of spaces in the city centre citing an “over provision” at present.
Formal plans are yet to be drawn up, but they’re likely to result in less spaces and increased parking charges.
Bereavement servicesResidents were recently hit by a massive rise in burial and cremation costs, but the budget proposals suggest there could be more to come over the next three years.
City residents can now expect to pay £964 instead of £790 previously for an adult burial and £737 instead of £641 for an adult cremation.
Those figures came into force earlier this month and could be set to increase further before 2020.
RoadsThere is due to be a £100,000 reduction to the highways repair budget from April.
But the council budget report insists potholes deeper than 1.5in will still be repaired within five days.
Coun Mutton said: “I would hope the backlog of repair work would continue to get smaller.
“In 2010 we increased the annual budget for road repairs by £3m.”
What is the scale of the cuts?
The £36m cuts targeted for 2020 amount to roughly 15 per cent of the council’s overall budget.
About £95m of central government funding has been lost already since austerity kicked in during 2010. That amount is expected to increase to £120m by 2020.
When the council reaches 2020 roughly £650m will have been saved since 2010.
Mon Nov 21, 2016 11:14 am
Mon Nov 21, 2016 1:56 pm
Fri Dec 02, 2016 8:08 pm
Rubbish left overflowing as bin men walk out over workload row
Thousands of homes didn’t have their bins emptied after refuse collectors walked out over council plans to ditch weekly rubbish collections.
Around half of the 100 waste collection staff employed by Coventry City Council are understood to have walked out after a lengthy meeting to discuss potential job losses , holiday allowance and increased workloads under the council plans recently revealed by the Telegraph .
Council bosses say that of the 25 rounds that were due to be completed on Thursday, just 16 were completed. That meant almost 100 streets and 5,500 homes were left with full bins.
Mick Shortland, the Whitley bin depot’s Unite the Union representative, told the Telegraph the walk out was not unofficial strike action and was not supported by the union.
But he said staff were concerned at the proposed changes and revealed there had been a “lengthy and heated” meeting which had overrun, leading some people to go home rather than complete the bin rounds.
He added: “People are concerned at the threat of redundancies, we want to know what type of services there will be and any affect on holiday allocation - although that’s not a top priority.
“There’s also concern about potential extra workload. We have no problem with that, as long as we have the people to deliver the service.
“Unfortunately these cuts are being made as a result of government cuts.”
Mon Jul 03, 2017 4:58 pm
Mon Jul 03, 2017 7:21 pm
Tue Aug 29, 2017 10:10 am
Tue Aug 29, 2017 4:08 pm
Wed Aug 30, 2017 3:06 pm
Wed Aug 30, 2017 4:37 pm
Councillors fear rubbish pile-up amid 'alarming' rise of missed bin collections
AN ‘ALARMING’ rise in complaints about missed bin collections in Coventry has been slammed by Conservative councillors.
Complaints have soared by over 80 per cent in three months – from 119 in April to 218 in July – according to data obtained under Freedom of Information laws by Tory councillors after the Deputy Cabinet Member for City Services refused to disclose the figures in a public meeting.
Coventry City Council said a number of vacant posts were being filled by agency workers to reduce staffing levels ahead of the switch to fortnightly collections in September.
A spokesperson for Coventry Conservatives said: “It’s the first time the Council has admitted the problems have been created by staff shortages. The Council has previously said problems were isolated incidents such as access problems caused by parked vehicles.”
Allesley Green resident Mike Walker said: “Collections were due to start on March 8. Since then 10 collections were due but 60 per cent weren’t collected until the following day and in one case not until the following Saturday.
“No one at the call centre seems to know where the crews are once they have left the depot.”
The Conservatives are seeking reassurances the situation will improve in September.
Leader of Coventry Conservatives and Woodlands ward Councillor, Coun Gary Ridley said: “Many residents have been affected by a number of missed bin collections and the huge rise in complaints is extremely alarming. With the switch to a new collection schedule residents will want assurances that we don’t end up with rubbish piled high like there is in Birmingham.”
Some Birmingham residents have not had their bins collected for up to seven weeks following a summer of strike action by the city’s refuse workers.
Shadow Cabinet Member for City Services, Coun Tim Sawdon, added: “These figures reveal a very serious problem and the Council needs to get a grip – fast. Uncollected bins could become a magnet for maggots and other pests.”
A council spokesperson said: “The Council recognises that there have been delays in refuse collections over the past few months and we apologise for the inconvenience caused to residents.
“We are continuing to work hard to ensure that we catch up on late collections, while at the same time we prepare for the implementation of our new services that will be introduced in the week beginning September 11.”