The Bins in Bury!

CONCERNED residents say controversial changes to waste collections are encouraging neighbours to fill their bins with the wrong rubbish.   Karen Unsworth said she is furious that rubbish has been left strewn near her Bury home after someone stuffed her recycling bin with two bags full of household waste.    The bags were left behind when binmen collected her rubbish and have now been left in unsightly piles in the alley behind the house in Chesham Crescent, Freetown.  

But Miss Unsworth, aged 53, said a council initiative to collect non-recyclable household waste every three weeks, which kicked in earlier this month, means this sort of neighbourly behaviour will become 'inevitable'.   

She said:  'I do my recycling and leave the correct bins out at the right time.  I cannot live like this, with rubbish everywhere, and I should not have to.  Already the smell is horrendous as the rubbish is spread all over – it is absolutely disgusting. ' 

Miss Unsworth, a Debenhams store worker, said she has also noticed more large rubbish items including bags of nappies, bricks and white goods are being fly-tipped on the land behind her home.

 She added: 'The new collections have only been in place a matter of weeks and already there is more fly-tipping than ever.'

A Bury Council spokesman said the authority had no evidence to suggest non-recyclables being put into recycling bins had become a particular problem.   

Mike Owen, executive director of resources and regulation at Bury Council, said:

'If any resident does identify contamination of their bin by a neighbour, or anyone else, they should report it to the council and it will be investigated discreetly by a waste management officer. Confidentiality will always be respected.   To reduce the risk of this happening  residents need to be vigilant.  If possible do not put your bins out for collection until as close as possible to 7am on the scheduled day of collection and retrieve them as soon as possible after they have been emptied.   Residents should also number all bins, to make it clear to which address they belong.' 

(First reported in Bury Times: Wednesday 22 October 2014)