Waste piling up after bins not emptied, say residents

Rubbish, food and recycling bins have been piling up on some city streets, according to residents who claim they have not had a collection in weeks.

Bristol residents have been posting on social media to say their black bins and recycling have not been collected in three weeks.

One resident in Horfield, posting on the Love Horfield Group, commented: "It's disgusting! I know they're playing catch-up but surely just take the food waste?"

Bristol Waste apologised and said it had been unable to collect from a number of streets this week due to "significant staffing issues" and the "knock-on effects" of the "recent extreme red weather conditions".

Wesley Harrison, who lives on Blackthorn Close in Hartcliffe, said he has grown increasingly frustrated with Bristol Waste after his rubbish was not collected for two weeks in a row. This was then compounded by workers collecting recycling on the opposite side of his street, but not his.

He said: "My question on multiple occasions was and still is 'what do I do with the two weeks worth or recycling that is in my kitchen attracting flies?'.

"No proper answer apart from using carrier bags. I've got a box full of glass, a box full of plastic, a big cardboard box full of cans, and a blue bag full of cardboard. I have started to throw recycling in the black bin as well.

He complained the recycling outside is attracting rodents and the food waste bin was crawling with maggots.

"I'm paying my council tax for this. I pay full whack because I work, and for what?" he added.

Bristol Waste thanked people for their patience in a post on social media on Tuesday and said its crews were working hard to catch up.

But the post attracted more than 100 comments from residents, many who were frustrated their bins had been left uncollected for weeks.

Emma Gibson said her road should have had a collection last month.

Imogen Parry added: "Ours should have been done last Tuesday but still nothing. I have phoned three times now and each time it is being escalated but nothing."

Melita Burt said her daughter had not had a collection for three weeks, adding it would "be wonderful if they actually get a collection this week".

While Lee Godfrey said: "This will be the [third] time it hasn't been collected."

Sharon Hudd said: "Bristol Waste Company why can't you hold your hands up and say we can't manage the contract? Because heat or not, that's the long and short of it."

Bristol Waste said it had been unable to collect from a number of streets this week and advised residents to leave containers out, as its teams would return for missed collections as soon as possible.

"Adapting our operations to keep teams safe from dangerous heat has caused unavoidable delays to recycling collections," a spokeswoman said.

"Crucially, our recovery efforts are facing an additional hurdle as, like many others in the sector, we are also facing a significant shortage of drivers for the collection vehicles."

The company said it was "working extremely hard to catch up on as many collections as possible this week".

"To help get our services back to normal, we are launching a major driver recruitment campaign," the spokeswoman added.

She added it would also be pausing paid garden waste collections for two weeks in order to redeploy drivers to its recycling collections service.

Additional reporting by the Local Democracy Reporting Service

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