One of the large volume of topics that residents raise with
me, in my councillor’s post bag, is the large numbers of missed collections of
kitchen waste.
In Southfield, residents saw, when the wheelie bins rolled
in - like Daleks – dirty streets and a huge number of missed collections of
their household waste. Since then kitchen waste has not been collected as often
as it should be.
Sometimes the same person has missed their collection for
many consecutive weeks. Other times whole streets are missed.
From a resident who comments recently the contractor said
they did not collect the waste because the resident’s gate was closed (not
locked, just closed!) Given the Council is allowing the contractor to get away
with such a poor level of service a positive future is not likely.
Liberal Democrats believe that how clean our streets are and
how the contractor is performing should be more transparent. The facts
published by Ealing Council often are always a positive gloss on the reality of
what is happening in our streets.
One weekend the Southfield Liberal Democrats found over 400
environmental faults and issues. At a similar time the Council said things were
fine!
Given this I am challenging the Council’s portfolio holder, responsible
for rubbish issues, to visit Southfield ward and see for himself. Cynically I
expect him to prime the contractors first (so they can buck their ideas up in
the short term) but let’s hope he and the contractors learn a few lessons about
the need to keep our streets clean.
Liberal Democrats say that if the portfolio holder refuses an
invitation for a visit, then nobody can really respect him. I say that he
should clean all 100 or so streets in Southfield until residents are satisfied!
