Why do people feel so comfortable lying to councils?

[FoxEye]

What do your Councillors regularly lie to you about?

Just one example. Something that happened recently.

A flyer was posted through our door, saying that one of our local councillors had personally canvassed the area, speaking to all householders. They claimed that the vast majority were in favour of introducing a new parking zones covering our estate. We would now have to pay an annual fee to the council to park outside our houses.

When talking to our neighbours, none of them had been visited, and all were opposed.

It's things like that.

 

[JohnnyG]

Just one example. Something that happened recently.

A flyer was posted through our door, saying that one of our local councillors had personally canvassed the area, speaking to all householders. They claimed that the vast majority were in favour of introducing a new parking zones covering our estate. We would now have to pay an annual fee to the council to park outside our houses.

When talking to our neighbours, none of them had been visited, and all were opposed.

It's things like that.

One instance isn't predictable regularly.

 

[FoxEye]

One instance isn't predictable regularly.

I don't like your tone. Perhaps you could improve your reading comprehension, tho?

Just one example.

 

[arknor]

One instance isn't predictable regularly.

but it's a clear example that democracy is dead and the people "can't be trusted to make the right decision", let's make it for them and pretend if you disagree you must be in the minority.

Disgusting

 

[estebanrey]

Dont exactly have a high opinion of the council... each year they reduce services (e.g. decreasing bin collection frequency) and increase cost to the taxpayer. That for me straight off the bat is mismanagement and an inability to manage their budget properly through probably incompetence...so they pass off their incompetencies to the taxpayer.

Again, another person who thinks council tax is paid purely for the individual services they use.

Have you considered that maybe the ageing population in your area has significantly increased social care costs? Or that the recent recession means more people rely on social housing and need council tax benefit?

You don't pay council tax to get your bins collected how you want, you pay into a fund for the betterment of society around you.

Councils are there to meet the needs of society and not the wants of individual tax payers.

The flipside to the OP's question... our councillors have absolutely no qualms about lying to us, and do so with predictable regularity.

Councillors aren't my favourite people either, seem like they're hated by the public and council employees alike.

Bin day tomorrow I had better make sure the handle is facing the road!

Have you ever tried to pull a full 240 litre bin that weighs over 20 kilos with wheels on only one side by the lip? It digs into your fingers and the bin scrapes along the ground.

Not a major issue when you're putting your bin out, but now imagine having to repeat that another 1,000 odd times over 8 hours and let me know how you still can't see why being able to pull it straight by the handle with the wheels is that much easier.

 

[JohnnyG]

I don't like your tone. Perhaps you could improve your reading comprehension, tho?

Oh, sorry.
You've provided one instance which doesn't really answer my question.
You said -

our councillors have absolutely no qualms about lying to us, and do so with predictable regularity.

So what do they lie about to you with predictable regularity?

 

[Outcast]

Again, another person who thinks council tax is paid purely for the individual services they use.

Have you considered that maybe the ageing population in your area has significantly increased social care costs? Or that the recent recession means more people rely on social housing and need council tax benefit?

You don't pay council tax to get your bins collected how you want, you pay into a fund for the betterment of society around you.

Councils are there to meet the needs of society and not the wants of individual tax payers.



Councillors aren't my favourite people either, seem like they're hated by the public and council employees alike.




Have you ever tried to pull a full 240 litre bin that weighs over 20 kilos with wheels on only one side by the lip? It digs into your fingers and the bin scrapes along the ground.

Not a major issue when you're putting your bin out, but now imagine having to repeat that another 1,000 odd times over 8 hours and let me know how you still can't see why being able to pull it straight by the handle with the wheels is that much easier.

As my old boss Barry Breakall used to say "My heart bleeds buckets of snot for ya"

Try hand unloading 23 tonnes of fertiliser in 50kg bags every day.

If you don't like, or can't do the job then move over and give it to someone that does & can !

 

[estebanrey]

As my old boss Barry Breakall used to say "My heart bleeds buckets of snot for ya"

Try hand unloading 23 tonnes of fertiliser in 50kg bags every day.

If you don't like, or can't do the job then move over and give it to someone that does & can !

So what you're saying is common courtesy and a bit of consideration shouldn't happen? Me making sure my bin is turned around so the guys can pull it out a lot more easily and which takes me 5 seconds is wasted time on the basis that these people (bin men) sign up to a hard job anyway?

 

[Outcast]

As I said in my OP... The Binsters around here are good but they certainly don't put the bin back in an orderly fashion like the way they find it !

It's abandoned anywhere on the driveway...Sometimes halfway between properties.

Hey Ho.. Life is soooo hard !

 

[fatiain]

As I said in my OP... The Binsters around here are good but they certainly don't put the bin back in an orderly fashion like the way they find it !

It's abandoned anywhere on the driveway...Sometimes halfway between properties.

Hey Ho.. Life is soooo hard !

My bin's usually outside 2 doors up, it's a whole 10 yards to walk and get it!

 

[UTmaniac]

We "get away" with not moving our bins to a different point for collections, but our general bin is always parked on the drive/pathway boundary and the recycling bin is parked behind it.

Our downstairs neighbours do the same, but their bins are further up the drive behind our two.

All bins are normally emptied without issue, plus the small grey box of empty jar/bottles, but I have often wondered whether we should be moving our recycle bin closer to the pavement for collection and whether downstairs should be moving both of their bins... Especially as sometimes their van is parked in the drive when the rubbish lorries arrive, barely leaving enough room to pull those 3 "buried" bins out.

They aren't placed back in their normal spots after being emptied, simply left on the drive/pavement, it gives the butler something to do.

 

[estebanrey]

We "get away" with not moving our bins to a different point for collections, but our general bin is always parked on the drive/pathway boundary and the recycling bin is parked behind it.

Our downstairs neighbours do the same, but their bins are further up the drive behind our two.

All bins are normally emptied without issue, plus the small grey box of empty jar/bottles, but I have often wondered whether we should be moving our recycle bin closer to the pavement for collection and whether downstairs should be moving both of their bins... Especially as sometimes their van is parked in the drive when the rubbish lorries arrive, barely leaving enough room to pull those 3 "buried" bins out.

They aren't placed back in their normal spots after being emptied, simply left on the drive/pavement, it gives the butler something to do.

I had to deal with a situation like this. The resident was leaving both their bins at the boundary meaning only one was correctly presented.

Our guys didn't take the one further back on one occasion which generated a complaint. I sent the guys the back (we're not all total jobsworths) but also advised the resident to simply swap them around after each collection which they agreed to do.

The way I look at it is the bin collection guys have a hard job I wouldn't be prepared to do, so the least I can do is swap my bins around once a week which is very little effort to me but makes their job that bit easier.

 

[bitslice]

This is not true today though. Most of the people I work with that are my age or younger are degree level educated and could easily find well paying jobs in the private sector.

Explain the council Road Planning Department then.

No way is that staffed by anything more capable than monkeys with ADHD.

 

[eatcustard]

Council workers, nice but dim

 

[eatcustard]

This is not true today though. Most of the people I work with that are my age or younger are degree level educated and could easily find well paying jobs in the private sector.

Means nothing, we have staff with degrees and they are as thick as pig poo

Common sense > degree

 

[B@Th*nG]

Because they feel so comfortable lying to us.

bingo!

B@

 

[Combat squirrel]

Those were also the days where there was little to no social care taking massive chunks of the budget. Believe it or not the amount going toward bin collections is a fraction of your Council Tax and therefore we can no longer afford to have 6 men teams of guys.

There is also the issues of compensation paid to former bin men who later claim because they had to work for 40 years bending over picking up heavy bags, they now have bad backs and mobility problems.

Sadly we live in a litigious society, it is very easy to sue former employers for physically stressful jobs but also for residents because we did walk onto their property and broke their favourite gnome whilst retrieving their bin.

Sadly people only tend to think in isolation, they thing an extra two steps is nothing. What they forget is that the guys are servicing around 1,500 households a day and those extra few seconds per household turn into a few extra hours when you multiply it across the whole round.



Your problem with that is?



You are a common example of someone who thinks their council tax only pays for bin collections and the street lightning.

How much you pay in council tax is irrelevant to how much your council pays towards bin collections.

In my authority only about 90p a week from your CT goes to bin collections, a tiny fraction of what you're paying. As I stated above that extra 'foot' has a huge multiplcation cost when you consider all the houses being serviced.

I think your responses here perfectly demonstrate why people really don't care for councils - pedantic hell, utter lack of common sense and oodles of pedantic barriers.

I think you would find you would have more money for useful tasks if the council fired many members of pen pushing staff who are paid to drive around measuring 25cm from where the bin 'should have been'

If you would just kindly get on with it within the realms of common sense, you would save months of work time not having to deal with complaints. Certainly more than enough to pay the extra for the bin man to walk 2 seconds longer to a bin!! lol

Lets do some maths, say Mr Binman walks an extra 2 seconds to reach a bin, 1500 houses (that's assuming EVERY house has their bin in the 'wrong' place, which of course they won't)

2 seconds x 1500 = 3000 seconds

3000 seconds = 50 minutes

Now of course, if you remove your job - the person who handles the councils insane level of pedantic silly rules, that would more than pay for that extra hours over time - but now of course you point out that a tiny percentage of people don't put their bin in the right place..............so really, 5 mins extra for the whole round, MAX.

See its taken me a good couple of minutes to write this, to whom and which council shall I send my bill ?

 

[LeeUK]

My wheelie bin got stolen and set on fire once. So I stole the wheelie bin from the rented flat my sister was moving out of and phoned the council saying they had missed my bin. They came the next day to empty it. Hehe

 

[LeeUK]

And councils lie to us too.. I was late paying a PCN to Newcastle City Council (not the council I pay council tax to) and it had gone to the bailiffs. I paid the council direct but they returned the payment and were adamant I had to pay the bailiff instead.

After I showed them the law that once the PCN had been paid directly to the council the debt was legally discharged (even after they had refunded me) and that I was not liable for their bailiff charges as the bailiff failed to enforce the debt, they soon scuttled off back under their stone licking their wounds.

 

[Diagro]

We have those Plastic inserts for the Recycle bins that the cardboard needs chopping up to go into. (i dont mind, something to do at midnight..)

The Binmen have so far broken 7 of them, They just chuck them back into the bin and in turn crack the insert which then falls into the bin. Its supposed to lip over the edge to stay at the top.

Lucky for me the council will replace them for free as its the Binmens fault. But 4 this year alone... mental

Although they do walk up the drive and go the extra 10 foot when i forget to put the bin at the road somethimes So imo they are just heavy handed