brown bin and local council "rage"

dLockers said:
Are you forgetting to account for the ******* lorry that is highly specialised to collect your trash and then cost of getting rid of it? Or do you genuinely think £36 for the bin is the only cost?
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As I regularly use skips and grab bags (home and work) I am aware of the high cost of waste disposal, but this regular service that a very high proportion of the area use and only collects garden waste has a very different cost.

The council sell the composted waste from the grown garden bins and based on the speed of collection and allowing for breaks, longer gaps in route etc, I still calculate they way more than cover the vehicle and employee costs with the roughly £2.70 per collection and revenue from the composted material. Other councils in similar areas of the UK charge less for their garden waste bin so ours is definitely not being generous.
 
Our garden bin was cracked when we moved in, our council replaced it for free.

On another note anyone else struggle with bin capacity in general waste?
We have the bigger bin offered by our council (240l) but I'm still having to get in the bin and jump on it every fortnight to fit everything in. We are recycling as much as we can (that bin is normally full every fortnight as well)

I even rang the council and anther local waste company today to see if we could have a commercial waste collection, but neither of them could.
 
bigmike20vt said:
over egging maybe..... but annoyance for sure.

last autumn my other wise good shape got pretty much destroyed when emptied. it has a crack top to bottom the entire length of the bin.

the bin is only 6 years old after the old one was nicked so no wear and tear ... and it was barely full when emptied.
as it was the end of the season I didn't bother as bin replacement was always free however I went to report it today and they want £30 . that is on top of the £45 a year I have to pay. cheesed off about that. whilst I can't be sure how the bin men did it I can only assume they caught it in the machine somehow as these are tough bins.

apparently they can't sustain replacing all the stolen bins or neglected ones. but this was neither stolen more neglected it was damaged by the bin men.
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What's your brown bin used for? Annoyingly our garden waste bin was also split by the bin men, it's when they throw them onto the back of the truck when they're heavy. But it doesn't leak so I haven't bothered to source a replacement.

MassiveJim said:
On another note anyone else struggle with bin capacity in general waste?
We have the bigger bin offered by our council (240l) but I'm still having to get in the bin and jump on it every fortnight to fit everything in. We are recycling as much as we can (that bin is normally full every fortnight as well)
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I would almost bet that you're chucking in recyclable waste. Do you recycle your soft plastics? - pretty much anything that fruit and veg comes in, or any packaging from the freezer, or bags for bread.

We've got the smaller bin, and everything that can be recycled gets recycled so we're barely using 2/3rds of the bin a fortnight.
 
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MassiveJim said:
Our garden bin was cracked when we moved in, our council replaced it for free.

On another note anyone else struggle with bin capacity in general waste?
We have the bigger bin offered by our council (240l) but I'm still having to get in the bin and jump on it every fortnight to fit everything in. We are recycling as much as we can (that bin is normally full every fortnight as well)

I even rang the council and anther local waste company today to see if we could have a commercial waste collection, but neither of them could.
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Our council (east riding) use blue bins for recycling and they let you have more than 1, and they're not the really narrow ones. We have 2 blue (recycling), 1 green (general) and a brown (garden waste). Don't have to pay extra for any of them. Our general waste doesn't normally get that full except recently where I've been breaking up a fence and stuffing it in :p .
 
Semple said:
What's your brown bin used for? Annoyingly our garden waste bin was also split by the bin men, it's when they throw them onto the back of the truck when they're heavy. But it doesn't leak so I haven't bothered to source a replacement.



I would almost bet that you're chucking in recyclable waste. Do you recycle your soft plastics? - pretty much anything that fruit and veg comes in, or any packaging from the freezer, or bags for bread.

We've got the smaller bin, and everything that can be recycled gets recycled so we're barely using 2/3rds of the bin a fortnight.
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our council is really fussy what goes in the different bins. and sometimes they have a quick rummage and if they see anything in the wrong bin they won't take it. most food wrapping is a big no no, even cardboard you have to be careful depending on what it is covered with. basically if it says check local recycling then it's a no.
the brown bin is only garden stuff, grass cuttings and the like
my parents have about half a dozen little bins and a big compost one. it takes a little more work sorting but they take a lot more to be recycled.
it's another post code.lottery (and they cheese me off,.we all pay council tax so should all get the equivalent service - their area also has better doctors better schools as well(something I took for granted back in the day)
 
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bigmike20vt said:
our council is really fussy what goes in the different bins. and sometimes they have a quick rummage and if they see anything in the wrong bin they won't take it. most food wrapping is a big no no, even cardboard you have to be careful depending on what it is covered with. basically if it says check local recycling then it's a no.
the brown bin is only garden stuff, grass cuttings and the like
my parents have about half a dozen little bins and a big compost one. it takes a little more work sorting but they take a lot more to be recycled.
it's another post code.lottery (and they cheese me off,.we all pay council tax so should all get the equivalent service - their area also has better doctors better schools as well(something I took for granted back in the day)
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I think council tax is a different value in different areas though (although not sure which bits would change).
 
In Derby they started to charge for garden waste/brown bin collections £45 a year. Most people didnt pay that and the bins were taken away. Then a year after that (i believe there was a change from Labour to Conservative council) they decided they were doing free garden waste/brown bin collections and everyone got a spangly new brown bin.. Then later in that year my colleague was on holiday in Bulgaria and on the beaches she noticed there were brown bins half sunk in the sand for general waste... They all were Derby City Council brown bins.. :cry:

It was even in the local news! https://www.derbytelegraph.co.uk/news/derby-news/brown-bin-derby-bulgaria-1727951
 
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theone8181 said:
I think council tax is a different value in different areas though (although not sure which bits would change).
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I have no idea. all I know is my council tax has gone up considerably over the last decade but the service dropped equally considerably. I have also noticed and increase in fly tipping.
 
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Semple said:
What's your brown bin used for? Annoyingly our garden waste bin was also split by the bin men, it's when they throw them onto the back of the truck when they're heavy. But it doesn't leak so I haven't bothered to source a replacement.



I would almost bet that you're chucking in recyclable waste. Do you recycle your soft plastics? - pretty much anything that fruit and veg comes in, or any packaging from the freezer, or bags for bread.

We've got the smaller bin, and everything that can be recycled gets recycled so we're barely using 2/3rds of the bin a fortnight.
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I live in a house with 2 small children, a 5 month old baby, my partner and 2 dogs.
As far as I'm aware we recycle as much as we possibly can. Our recycling bin has a plastic insert for cardboard that usually doesn't fit in the bin on collection day as the bin is so full.
We have 3 separate bins in our kitchen and the kids have learnt to use them correctly.
So I'm fairly confident we are doing our bit.
There will obviously be an odd bit of recycling that inevitably ends up in general waste, but it will be minimal.
 
We have 1 wheelie bin for rubbish, 1 for recycling and 1 for garden and I'm forever filling the garden bin to the brim, last weekend they refused to take it as it was too heavy, a chap from the council came around to today to empty on it on the proviso I helped him load it on his van and he gave me an extra garden bin for free, chuffed to bits, first time I've ever got anything out of North Tyneside Council.
 
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Ours is £65 a bin now, forget that. North of £3k a year and they cant provide a brown bin and collect waste bins fortnightly, what a racket..

I compost all my waste now, big heap in the garden the rest goes down the allotment. Cut grass is used to mulch which is very useful, as are all the leaves once rotted for 6 months.
 
200sols said:
Ours is £65 a bin now, forget that. North of £3k a year and they cant provide a brown bin and collect waste bins fortnightly, what a racket..

I compost all my waste now, big heap in the garden the rest goes down the allotment. Cut grass is used to mulch which is very useful, as are all the leaves once rotted for 6 months.
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Wow 3k a year in ct, ours is 2/3rds that and free bins. I was a bit annoyed when they went from weekly to fortnightly pickups but it's not too bad once your used to it.
 
MassiveJim said:
On another note anyone else struggle with bin capacity in general waste?
We have the bigger bin offered by our council (240l) but I'm still having to get in the bin and jump on it every fortnight to fit everything in. We are recycling as much as we can (that bin is normally full every fortnight as well)

I even rang the council and anther local waste company today to see if we could have a commercial waste collection, but neither of them could.
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How big is your family?! We're the opposite; weekly waste collection and we usually have a single bag in there, some weeks none, whereas our 2 weekly recycling is 3/4 full by the end of week 1!
 
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