Not Bin Around Lately

Yesterday I bounced down my front drive on my orange space hopper just in time to meet the bin men. They were struggling with the various bags and detritus that had been left out for the fortnightly collection. I decided to put the space hopper aside and help the chaps out. I carried two bulging bags to the bin truck and chucked them into crushers. One of the bin men gave me a hearty pat on the back and said ‘cheers pal’ and then he jumped onto the footplate of the truck as it pulled away.  So I copied his action and did likewise. Wrong move Derek! What happened next is part of a formal investigation that will be conducted by my council so I don’t want to go into too much detail because of sub judice.

In summary:  after deciding to volunteer to help out on the bin round, I was told by the once cheerful bin man to f-off and then physically booted off the truck. When I told him I wanted to be part of the big society he simply laughed and left me standing at the end of my road feeling like a fool. Well I wasn’t going to take this, so I jumped astride my trusty space hopper and gave chase. When I caught up with the truck I accosted the driver to further make my point about Dave Cameron’s ambitious plans. This was a complete waste (no pun intended) of time. I left by telling them that Uncle Eric was soon going to force them to come out collecting rubbish every week and they just laughed and said good, as long as he doubles their wages.

This has left the Tickles household scarred. We are considering investigating of opting out of waste collection from the council and going private. I am sure I can save money if I start incinerating rubbish in my back yard and the rest I will bury behind the rose bushes.

Here is my latest Freedom of Information request:

Dear Chums

Last year Uncle Eric Pickles said:

“It’s a basic right for every English man and woman to be able to put the remnants of their chicken tikka masala in their bin without having to wait a fortnight for it to be collected.”

I have searched long and hard to see if this right is enshrined in the European Convention of Human Rights Act. As you can probably guess it is not and is surely reason to ditch this busy bodies charter.

I assume that Uncle Eric would wish to extend this right to our non-English neighbours who live and pay taxes to councils and probably means just within England. Anyway I fear I am in danger of digressing and do not want to risk being declared vexatious.

At the weekend the Secretary of State revealed he intends to incentivise councils to re-introduce weekly bin collections. Can you please supply me the following information:

1 . How many councils currently do not have weekly bin collections?

2. What evidence does DCLG possess that residents of non weekly collection are less satisfied that those that receive weekly collection?

3. Assuming councils save money from fortnightly collections, have you an estimate on how much it will cost for all councils to return to weekly collections? (Perhaps Grant Shapps can help with this as he is the master of cost saving estimates). I assume councils will incur significant costs including renegotiating contracts.

4. How much more money does DCLG estimate that private waste collection companies will make in the return to weekly collection.

Your rubbish

Derek