Should we be compensated for missed bin collections?

By Elgan Hearn, Local Democracy Reporter

Villagers in Guilsfield are calling for compensation from Powys County Council after a missed week of bin collections.

The usual Tuesday collection on June 7 was missed, as was the case last week with a number in the Welshpool area, but the village did not see the collections until a week later on June 14.

By this time, recycling boxes were overflowing with cardboard, glass, plastic, and tin which had been left on the street for a week, meaning extra journeys for the overworked staff who were left short due to holidays and illness.

Guilsfield county councillor, Ian Harrison, said that due to “lots of concerns” from residents he had contacted Cllr Jackie Charlton, the cabinet member for a Greener Powys whose brief includes waste and recycling.

He also spoke to the recycling depot and had been “assured” that the recycling collection would happen on Wednesday (June 8) which “didn’t happen”.

Cllr Harrison believed that the communication of the issues on their website and Powys Recycling Facebook page has been “inconsistent at best”.

Cllr Harrison said: “Normally the recycling team are on time and very efficient, so I hope this service failure is an anomaly.

“If this fall in service standards were to continue then I certainly believe residents should challenge service value for money. People are quite rightly very frustrated at this service failure.”

A spokesman for Powys County Council said: “The waste and recycling service have recently experienced some staffing issues in the north of the county. In places, this has resulted in some delayed collections.

“Residents are advised to leave their recycling boxes out as the crews are working hard to catch up on all collections.”