News from Plymouth Labour

Scale of Plymouth bin chaos, “fiddled”, claim Labour

Plymouth City Council has been exposed as fiddling the figures as the city’s new bin collection services enters its sixth disastrous week.

Mark Coker, Labour’s Environment spokesperson on the Tory-controlled council is demanding that the Council should, “own up to the true picture of chaos in the city”.

Councillors in Plymouth were told at a full Council meeting earlier this week that around 200 complaints a day about missed bin collections had been logged since the scheme started in November. Councillor Coker has discovered however that the system for recording refuse collection complaints has been changed so that FOUR contacts from residents must be made before it its counted as a complaint.

“That means that the problem could be three or four times bigger than was previously reported. I was surprised to hear the Cabinet member (Cllr Michael Leaves) say the number because, from colleagues anecdotes, I felt that the problem was much bigger.

“Now I know why. The Council has changed the way it counts complaints so there is widespread undercounting. I call on Cllr Leaves to issue a statement stating the true position, and to issue a formal apology to all councillors who were given the wrong impression from his speech to the Council.”

Other news from Plymouth Labour

• Pasty Tax U-turn a victory for the Westcountry against out of touch Tories - 28 May 2012
• Jobs and the economy will be top priority for a Labour Council in Plymouth - 25 April 2012
• Now the Tories choose to hammer the South West - 22 April 2012