Anger as Birmingham bin collections missed - as council reveals 'long-term fix' will take months

Anger has continued to rise over missed bin collections in Birmingham as the city council issues a message to those affected. Bins have reportedly not been collected in several areas across Brum recently, including Bartley Green, Selly Park and Northfield.

Leanne Gregory, a resident of the latter, posted pictures of full bins and piles of rubbish bags on X, formerly Twitter, earlier this month. “This is what my streets now look like as Birmingham City Council did not collect our bins again,” she wrote.

The worrying problem for many residents was also raised during a meeting of the full council this week by the Green Party’s Julien Pritchard. “Given the appalling bin collection service in the last few months, when can residents in my ward and across the city expect some semblance of a reliable bin and recycling collection service?” he asked.

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Coun Majid Mahmood, the cabinet member for environment, responded by acknowledging the service was experiencing some “significant operation difficulties". They included vehicle availability at the Lifford Depot, the age of the vehicles and members of the workforce being absent.

“We are approximately 11 rounds behind,” the Labour councillor told the meeting. “The impact is only on refuse - we are continuing with the recycling and green collections.”

He continued that staff from other depots in Birmingham were providing support and that some overtime would be used over the next few days. Coun Mahmood added that there was a “long-term solution” being worked on, saying that plans to procure new vehicles were recently approved by cabinet.

“We should have some new vehicles coming through March,” he said. “In the meantime, we have had approval now for some hired vehicles going forward because the vehicles that we’ve actually got in the Lifford Depot, those that are more than 10-years-old, they’re even failing the MOTs so we’re struggling.”

Coun Pritchard fired back: “[Coun Mahmood] did mention new vehicles in March so is he seriously suggesting we have to wait until March until residents can count on their bin collections - and if not, then when?”

“I’m not sure Coun Pritchard was listening to my response - I did say the long-term solution is with the new vehicles that we have procured,” Coun Mahmood replied. “The solution short-term is getting some support from staff, both at Atlas Works and Perry Barr.

“You’ve got the support from them and also we’ve engaged with the vehicle hire supply chain". He continued: “People need to be reminded - we are the largest council in Western Europe. On a daily basis, 115,000 bins are emptied - in a week, that’s 575,000.”

In a statement issued after the meeting, Coun Mahmood said the waste service was undertaking a “significant and long overdue” change programme. These are set to include new vehicles, new staffing arrangements and, in the New Year, new collection systems.

“We understand this is unsettling for affected staff and are providing the necessary employee support,” he said. “We are experiencing a significant number of staff absences. This is impacting upon service performance which is being addressed in the short term, with support from staff at other depots.”

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Addressing the Brummies affected, he added: “Any residents whose bin isn’t collected on the normal collection day should leave their bin out and we’ll collect it as soon as we can. We apologise for this short-term impact on collections and ask for people’s patience and understanding as we continue to implement the most significant transformation of waste services in a generation.”

As part of these major changes, Birmingham City Council is set to move to a fortnightly collection of residual waste from spring 2025 onwards. “I know some residents are concerned about moving to a fortnightly residual waste service, but this will not be introduced until we have the food waste collections, meaning people will have less general waste,” Coun Mahmood previously said.

“There will be a phased introduction and we will be communicating all the changes to residents". The proposal to move to a fortnightly collection was included in the council’s unprecedented budget this year.

The local authority had found itself engulfed by a financial crisis, caused by Birmingham-specific issues, such as an equal pay fiasco and the disastrous implementation of a new IT and finance system, as well as factors such as the rising demand for services and funding cuts.