Comments on: Congratulations to Tory controlled Walsall Council

By: Paul Macmanomy

Paul Macmanomy — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 13:44:01 +0000

My recycling box was stolen, I contacted Walsall Council who assured me that a replacement would be with me within 2 weeks – that was 2 years ago. Since then I have only been able to recycle (with the Council)newspapers becuase quite rightly health and safety requirements meant that I could not leave anything else out in plastic carrier bags.
The point made about Links to Work is vital – here is an organisation which has provided employment (and supervisory opportunities) to a group of citizens who would otherwise find it difficult to access such opportunities (particularly those with learning difficulties(who have delivered an excellent plastic recycling scheme at the time that Walsall Council said it wasn’t interested. Unfortunately, at the same time as Walsall Council was patting itself on the back for being brilliant at recycling and issuing awards and plaudits for the way in which it interacts with people who have disabilities it forgot that the consequences of its new bin regime were to throw those very same people out of work!
Penguin as you say – WELL DONE WALSALL COUNCIL!

By: stymaster

stymaster — Tue, 31 Mar 2009 21:18:59 +0000

Actually, over here in sunny Walsall Wood, it's looking OK. We had teething troubles with the snow (no collection of recycling for weeks- the bottle and can pile was embarrassing), but it's now working well. Interestingly, one of our Councillors is asking for feedback on this very subject. He's actually quite a useful and decent chap, despite being a Conservative.

By: Clandestino

Clandestino — Mon, 30 Mar 2009 17:54:02 +0000

Hi there

Well I live in Caldmore. And although the Council should have emptied the new recycling green bin twice and that of my neighbours, they have so far failed to empty it even once. The street is now unsurprisingly full of rubbish and over flowing green wheelie bins!

By: Dan Brown

Dan Brown — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 19:24:48 +0000

did you ever ask your local councillors about your green box not being collected. We had the same problem phoned our local councillor and it was sorted and also got an extra box. very good. When you see what is happening in other parts of the country this new system in Walsall not too bad but recycling could do with being collected weekly and other bin every other week

By: Andrew

Andrew — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 14:51:30 +0000

There is one at Willenhall Chart Centre and a couple at Tesco in Willenhall. When we were in Walsall there eight at Morrisons (Town Centre) and they were regularly overflowing despite being emptied three times per week. That site started with one bin three years ago! It is a ‘no brainer’. Plastic comes from supermarkets so take it back and you can use the bags you took it in to carry the next lot of shopping home.

By: Grumpy Bob

Grumpy Bob — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 05:58:38 +0000

Here in Bedfordshire, we had a change made to our refuse collection a few years ago, both regular refuse and recyclable refuse would be collected fortnightly, on alternating weeks. I had a long correspondence with the council predicting a rise in maggot infestation and vermin. Subsequent advice from the council reflected this prediction was coming true – we were told to triple wrap food waste in plastic to prevent flies getting at it.
More recently, we’ve been given small bins with secure lids for recycling food waste – these get collected weekly. Bin count is now two wheely bins and a small bin.

By: Political Penguin

Political Penguin — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 01:19:05 +0000

@Andrew I think on this occasion I’m happy to chalk it down to an accidental missed collection which can happen in even the best circumstances.

With our recycling boxes it was very much a street-wide and somewhat strange issue. Two neighbouring roads always had their boxes emptied which is odd because they were collected at the same time, it just seemed that ours was always missed out/ignored.

On a couple of occasions we’d get reminders from Walsall MBC that if we didn’t recycle we’d get fined to which for a month or two everyones boxes would re-emerge to not be collected again and things went back to normal and no fines materialised. Odd, but that’s how it happened despite myself reporting this non-collection to the council a few times they just never seemed to emerge.

I have to admit that I’d not heard of Links to Work before nor noticed any specific green and yellow bins at either my doctors surgery or any of the three supermarkets I use. I’ll try to have a better look next time.

That reminds me, I must e-mail you.

By: Andrew

Andrew — Wed, 11 Mar 2009 08:57:48 +0000

Having moved from Walsall to Willenhall I can say that, in both places, the council managed to collect my recyclable box every two weeks and they even left me a note when the glass in it was not to their liking (and they refused to collect it!)

Like you we had our new bins. Last week they failed to collect my neighbours green bin saying that it had ‘ordinary rubbish’ in it. No surprise as the new scheme only started this week.

This week both bins are empty which is good. We have no idea what is going on with brown bin collections as they are not mentioned in leaflets and time tables.

Also, by putting plastic in your green bin you will be taking work away from Links to Work. This is a brilliant organisation who emply adults with multiple difficulties (in other words unemployable in a normal work environment) and pay them to sort out plastic collected in the bin green bins with yellow lids you see at supermarkets and doctors surgeries. So please continue to use those.