Once upon a time… I had a dustbin.  An old-fashioned affair, with a rounded galvanised metal lid atop a rounded galvanised metal body, and a handle on either side.  Into this dustbin went the ashes from the fire, the leftover food, the potato peelings and egg shells.  Living on my own, it was only half full when the bin-men came round every week.  It was kept out the back, and had to be carried through my flat to the front path, where one of the men would lift it easily, hoisted it onto his shoulder and heave the contents into the bin van.

Then the local council, in their vast and Holy wisdom, decreed my bin should be replaced by a black plastic wheelie bin twice the size.  They spent a few million quid on the new bins, and a few million more on new sooper-dooper mechanised vans, which didn’t require hoisting and heaving any longer, and what is more, could block the local roads much more efficiently.

From now on, collections would be only once a fortnight rather than weekly.  This was to improve the service.  Our council tax would now increase, to recover the costs of the improved service.  The council leader received an OBE and a guaranteed pension.

The new improved, family-sized wheelie bin was too large to keep at the back, and I could no longer carry its weight  through the flat, so it had to be permanently stored at the front, along with the bin belonging to the lady upstairs, where they disfigured the view.

Some time later, another wheelie bin appeared on our doorsteps.  Green this time.  This was to put garden waste and cardboard in, the council explained in an attached threatening letter, talking of fines for putting the bins out at the wrong time, in the wrong place, or mixing one type of waste with another.  Every dwelling in the street got one, including all the upstairs flats who had no gardens.  So now my flat had four bins outside — two for me and two for ‘er upstairs.  Shares in wheelie-bin makers shot through the roof, and our council tax increased again.

Then a small plastic box was dumped on us, for glass jars, bottles etc.  Plus a permanent green fabric bag for newspapers, junk mail etc.  The things were multiplying faster than streptomycin.  Now there were six bins and two bags of assorted sizes for visitors to see when they called.

Today, a quantum leap occurred.  In addition to the aforementioned lot, I now possess a grey food-waste bin, and a white bag for plastic bottles (to be washed, rinsed and separated from their tops on pain of death!)

Collections are now to be separated into Black Weeks and Green Weeks, says a leaflet issued by Councillor Heather something-or-other, who looks as if she lives on suet.  There is no swaztika on her arm, but somehow you get the impression of Herr Flick in disguise.)

“In Black veeks, you vill put out ze grey food bin, ze white plastic bottle bags, und ze black veelie-bins!  Zey vill be put out before 7.00 am!  Do not mix up your vaste, or it vill be ze vorse for you.”

So says the lady Gauleiter — sorry! — Councillor.  In Green weeks, she demands we put out the grey food-bins, the green glass-bottle box, the green newspaper bag, the green wheelie bin, and cardboard that has been flattened and placed under the food-waste bin.  Oh — and a partridge in a pear tree.

Her leaflet does not say what will happen if the Wheelie-bin Police catches me out in an infringement.  A week in the cooler, perhaps.

Or perhaps they will shoot one in ten of us, as an example to the others.

Lenko

Kevin B November 23, 2010 at 12:18

How did we get from the situation where we employ these guys to do a few
services for us – keep the roads clear, pick up the rubbish, patrol the
streets looking for malefactors, etc. – to one where we pay them to threaten
and humiliate us whilst they fail to provide those simple services?

How did we let the tail wag the dog in this kafkaesque fashion? WE pay
their salaries, pensions and benefits and THEY treat us like something nasty
they trod in.

Clarissa November
22, 2010 at 22:46

For better or worse my family have been separating potential recyclable
items from household waste for years simply because it made sense – rather
than at the diktats of some power hungry muppet. The result of this was that a
family of four barely managed to fill a single black bag on a weekly basis and
were constantly amazed at how much rubbish our neighbours managed to generate
over the same period.

Christine Hockett
November 22, 2010 at 22:22

Rather than the means of collection, I object to the rubbish that we
generate, expecting someone else (the council) to deal with, when we are
mostly capable of dealing with it ourselves in a responsible way. We have a
wheelie bin for “rubbish”, one for “recycling” and two “green” waste bins (one
council issue and one we pay extra for). However, we choose to travel very
week to our local HWR (Household Waste Recycling) site as we happily separate
out newspapers, glass and tins into our own boxes and bags, as I suspect the
cost and effort of resorting the “recycling” wheelie bin must be greater than
the benefit. (If it gets done at all). Anyway, paragons of virtue that we are,
doing our bit to save waste and landfill use – the trip to the “dump” was
incentivised with the added benefit of a little light retail therapy, as the
other dumpers and staff placed items to one side for which money changed hands
to go to charity. I never ceased to be amazed at the useful and good items
that people either:
a) Fail to take to the local auction house where it
would have readily found a buyer
b) Fail to eBay
c) Pass to a local
charity or charity shop
d) Advertise on the local “Freecycle”
website
The trip to the dump therefore became a weekly voyage of adventure
due to the laziness of my neighbours – sad on all counts but true. I have a
beautiful walnut hall table which cost £2 and my husband regularly managed to
feed his passion for hickory shafted golf clubs at £1 a club. It was recycling
in its purest form, reuse, and a pattern followed in many other places in the
country that we have visited during our travels. An exemplary dump being at
Forres in Scotland, where in addition to a very well run “shop” in a
collection of poly tunnels, timber is recycled into bird,owl and bat box kits
which are sold. Northamptonshire Council featured on our local news as they
opened a shop in a town where items from the local dump were being sold.
Everybody happy, the use of landfill cut, energy resources to recycle saved
and the occasional antique rescued. But I write in the past tense, as the
contract recently changed hands in our county and the “shops” disappeared
overnight from the councils’ 18 HWR sites. We were told that furniture was
being placed to one side for two local charities and everything else was being
“recycled”, with no further explanation for the change in what appeared to be
a sensible policy. My trips to my nearest HWR site are now very sad affair as
I see perfectly usable crockery, large garden pots, ornaments and mirrors in
the hardcore bin. Serviceable animal housing (I bought one of my rabbit
hutches from the dump) in the wood bin along with good furniture, which the
charity refuses as it is not up to their standard. The paper bin now has hard
backed books in it – presumably mostly out of print editions. Childrens’ toys
and this season’s garden furniture fill the hard plastic bin to overflowing.
My poor husband was nearly in tears the other week when he saw a set of his
favourite bladed irons in the metal bin, which once upon a time he could have
bought and used. I have commiserated with the staff as they are not happy
about this situation either as they see the waste of it all and have been
instructed not to remove anything from a bin. CCTV cameras ensuring that they
or the other dumpers don’t do so. I have complained, to the council and the
contractor, but have been told that everything is being recycled – I pointed
out that it is a waste of resources to process items that still have a life,
and wondered how many items of value were being lost forever because of this
policy. I have also asked about the videos, DVDs and CDs – which I happily
used to browse and purchase, and which now grace the skips and was told that a
“media” bin would soon be available, and that staff were advising people to
take all usable items to their local charity shop. My observations show that
they are not. The council is making a bid to be “the greenest county” due to
the high amount of “waste” it recycles. The scandal is rather not how the
items get to be recycled but what is actually being recycled. With Christmas
on the horizon, come January, I have no doubt that I will see again a lady
staggering to a bin under the weight of her fully decorated artificial tree. I
would have thought that where common sense failed to change these wasteful
habits the recession would, but when you hear people say on The Antiques
Roadshow that they removed the irreplaceable or valuable item from a skip –
you can now be sure it wasn’t from a HWR site in my county!

lenko
November 23, 2010 at 19:55

Sadly, most commenters seem to have missed my point. Maybe I di8dn’t make
it very well.

I have no objection to recylcing schemes, and often go to the HWR site
(we call it “the tip”) and dump my own stuff. I would be quite willing to do
this for ALL my rubbish. In fact, now that I have typed those words, perhaps
I will.

What my objection was, is how UGLY our councils have made this business.
Look at the photo. That is just my very own group of bins — Mummy green bin,
Daddy black bin, and all the little bins, boxes and bags. Six of the bloody
things, plus folded cardboard (not pictured).

Whereas when I moved in, 16 years ago, I had ONE bin which was kept at
the back. My frontage was uncluttered and as beautiful as I could keep it.
Now look at it.

Forgive me — I’m just whinging.

Christine
Hockett November 24, 2010 at 14:53

Lenko
What’s to forgive!
I would just say congratulations for
joining the weekly “do it yourself” brigade. It is the best response to
your problem. Those of us that can go to the tip weekly should, we
willingly buy the packaging, so we should take responsibility for it. Your
one bin 16 yrs ago would not have had to cope with the array of plastic
bottles, tetrapak, etc that we now accumulate on a daily basis and expect
someone else to deal with, even though we pay them dearly to. (Money best
spent on other “services”).
My point – perhaps also not well made, was
that the “ugliness” of the collection system may be a response to the
“stuff” people are now dumping which is reusable and has to be sorted. I
am concerned about the beauty of more than the frontage to my property.
The people who live in housing estates built over former landfill sites
may also agree. I did digress slightly because our local council has put a
firm stop to one of the best forms of recycling from the tip itself, the
place which should be the “last resort” for “rubbish” but illustrates the
point that for a lot of people, it is the only option, and they probably
congratulate themselves for taking the item there!
Another good tip –
if your HWR site does not have a shop for a little retail therapy – is to
think of the person or thing that may have upset you during the week, as
you hurl your bottles (individually) into the bin. (Fellow dumpers look at
you oddly if you speak aloud) The smash is deeply satisfying and could
possibly save the NHS a bundle too.
Enjoy!
Christine

SadButMadLad
November 22, 2010 at 19:23

I can see a need to keep the food waste seperate from all other waste –
because it’s yucky. But all the rest of the waste can and should be put into a
single wheelie bin and seperated at the refuse depot. Expecting the public to
know about every single type of waste and seperate them out according it
stupid. Can you say off the top of your head which plastic is ok and which
not? Is it 5 or 2? If the seperation is done at the depot, the workers there
will be the experts because they will have the experience and be able to work
quickly and efficiently.

Gildas the Monk
November 22, 2010 at 18:51

Great post
We are threatened with fines if we put a potato peeling in
the paper bin (or goodness what) and then quite often the bin men just dump
the stuff in all the same place anyway.
Little Hitlers at the Town Hall
love this stuff

ivan November 22, 2010 at 17:51

Food waste???? What is that? I have always cooked just enough so there will
be no waste – yes there are the potato peelings and odd things like that, any
left over edible food either goes into the freezer for later use or is
demanded by my Newfoundland.

I know I shouldn’t mention this but we have a garbage collection only twice
a week now – we, the village, didn’t see any point in having it more frequent
as we also get a special collection for large household items as well as after
holidays where there is likely to be large amounts of packing to be removed.
All this on my rates of 140 euro a year.

Bob November 23, 2010 at 22:31

Bit expensive to send foodwaste to Newfoundland isn’t it?

Beware of Geeks
Bearing GIFs November 22, 2010 at
17:51

Our council seemed to be ok at first – one black bin, weekly collection.
However recently they’ve started down the recycling paper, garden waste and
bottles route and have had the audacity to charge us extra for this.

I wrote back politely to the council opting out whereupon they wrote back
with lots of official forms asking what alternative measures I would be taking
to mitigating my refuse footprint.

I wrote back and said I would be using my neighbour’s bins.

I thought I’d get a visit from the council but no, they never bothered
following it up, so that was money well saved.

I throw everything in the black bin now. I must admit, I felt sorry for the
bin men once when I had managed to fill the thing with paving slabs. It took
two of them sweating, cursing and grimacing to drag this behemoth across to
the refuse lorry. The mechanised lifter was creaking and groaning as the bin
swung overhead and then suddenly there was this massive cacophony of
explosions and detonations as the paving stones plummeted into the stanching
steel bowels of the lorry, followed by more cursing from the startled bin
men

Bad, bad Geeks!

Dave H November 22, 2010 at 17:40

Our lot seem vaguely sensible at the moment. Plastic, glass, metal,
cardboard and paper in the blue bin, garden waste and food in the green one
and everything else in the black one. They even provide a plastic bag with an
adhesive strip on it that can be filled with used batteries and stuck to the
outside of the blue bin. I think they’ll have to re-think that bit soon,
batteries are a bit heavy for the adhesive and in the next village I saw a
load of batteries strewn over the road on the evening of collection day.

Joe Public November 22, 2010 at 17:19

How do the colour blind manage.

Anna
Raccoon November 22, 2010 at
17:30

Quick, Disability Discrimination Act, we could kybosh the scheme! All
bins withdrawn to be printed with braille.

Joe Public
November 22, 2010 at 17:51

And surely, they can’t associate ‘black’ bins with rubbish. There must
be an ethnic angle somewhere?

[No problem with associating ‘green’ with rubbish though!]

woodsy42
November 23, 2010 at 12:15

Green=rubbish is no problem as very few people are born green.

Ciaran December 14, 2010 at 15:42

They already have braille on, but not (as I noted once upon a time – http://ciarang.com/posts/240l ) to provide any useful
information.

Caedmon’s
Cat November 22, 2010 at 16:29

I heard the most plausible rationale to justify the expenditure of councils
on wheelie bins on a H & S course I once attended, where we were told it
was due to the increasing litigation against them by binmen, complaining of
spinal conditions resulting from having had to repeatedly hoist the galvanised
bins up to the dustcart. I can appreciate that, and sympathise with their
reasons, but waste collection has rapidly developed into a cause celebre for
petty bureaucrats with eco-fascist tendencies. Only the public sector could
spawn them..

lenko
November 23, 2010 at 19:38

The Councillors themselves, of course, are completely spineless.

Richard B November
22, 2010 at 16:19

Hmm. I often complain about our local council, but on this they seem to
have got it about right. We are very rural, so no wheelie bins. You make your
own arrangements for storage, and put the bags down on the main road for
collection. Black for general waste, orange for recyclables. And it’s once a
week (so far). My only objection is having to carry the bags 100m to the road
(the bin men used to collect from the house) but that’s hardly an issue when I
read what some folk have to put up with, as above. Garden waste is burnt, most
food waste is composted I have just come inside from filling two huge planters
with compost ready for a cherry and a plum tree that will be delivered soon,
and it’s marvellous stuff, and completely free.

My real complaint is that, living in the middle of nowhere but still paying
Band D rates, I see nothing for my money other than the aforementioned rubbish
collection (no drainage or sewerage, no street lights, no police …) when the
gypsy encampment a mile or two away seems to have all of that. But that’s a
separate rant, I guess.

JuliaM November
22, 2010 at 16:08

We haven’t had the food waste bins (or fortnightly collection) forced on us
yet, but it can only be a matter of time. Perhaps our council is waiting for a
nice hot summer?

Brian November 22, 2010 at 16:07

If you murder someone make sure you put them in the right bin. Just leaving
them somewhere counts as fly-tipping and the only defence to that is being a
traveller.

Demetrius November
22, 2010 at 15:21

Bin there, done that. We need to get all these foreigners out of our gaols
to make room for puzzled pensioners putting the plastic in the paper box and
the paper in the plastic box. If you murder someone you can just leave them
anywhere and they will be attended to and you will be given community service
if you plead stress.