A Twitter storm has erupted over the council’s decision to cut bin collections for over 100,000 Liverpool homes at the end of the month.
Liverpool’s 80,000 terrace houses will continue having weekly collections of their purple bins but the city’s remaining 136,000 houses will now face the new fortnightly collection of their household waste.
Liverpool residents reacted angrily on Twitter to the news with some claiming favouritism for residents who lived in terrace housing.
Twitter user @DoubleUSee said: “If we all pay towards Council Tax and services, no reason why type of house/street warrants favourable treatment.”
Other Twitter users raised concerns over time scale, council tax fees, council spending and storage issues with large families.
Twitter user @alidan51 said: “There was anarchy on the streets when the bin men went on strike for two weeks so how is this going to work.”
Another user @Mark_85 said: “Makes you wonder if they’re doing this to save £1m a year, why did they buy Finch Farm for £13m”
Twitter user @WEARECASTRO said: “How about charging council staff for parking, get rid of the mayor’s car and scrap council hospitality allowance. #hypocrisy”
Another user @evertonmad1878 said: “so does that mean a reduction in council tax?” Similarly, user @VAMOSMH said: “I look forward to receiving the discount in council tax due to the reduced service.”
The changes to the collections mean that purple household waste bins will now be collected fortnightly with blue recycling bins being collected in the alternating week.
The new scheme aims to reduce council costs and increase recycling across the city when they come in to effect on 28th of October.
A spokesperson for GrotSpots Liverpool, a local environmental group, said: “We are concerned that the introduction of fortnightly collections will lead to an increase in dumping, fly-tipping and littering as residents’ bins are filled well in advance of their collection. When bins are full it is only a matter of time before people turn to illicit disposal methods.”
Liverpool councillors initially voted in favour of an alternate weekly collections scheme in January despite Mayor Joe Anderson promising to keep the weekly collections in the run up to the 2012 mayoral election.
The council hope that the new scheme will save around £1m a year and increase recycling by 10 per cent.
Councillor Steve Munby, cabinet member for living environment and localism, said: “It costs us about £32m a year on collecting, recycling and disposing waste in the city. But this is not just an exercise in reducing costs – it is about the environmental impact it will have.”
The recycling rate for Liverpool, at 26%, is considerably lower than the county’s average of 37% and remains behind other major cities which have an average of 30.07%.
Liverpool households will receive information packs about the changes and new collection dates in the coming weeks.