Approved: More than 120 Shropshire recycling banks axed
Shropshire Council bosses have approved plans to axe more than 120 recycling banks in a bid to save more than £230,000.
The council’s cabinet gave the controversial plans the nod during a meeting this week.
The sites to close will be the “bring bank” sites which have bins for glass, cans, newspapers and textiles among others.
Councillor Lezley Picton, portfolio holder for culture and leisure, told cabinet members that the recycling banks did not provide value for money.
She said the areas around them were also often plagued by fly-tipping.
However, the Labour group leader, Councillor Alan Mosley, said 80 per cent of people who answered the consultation did not agree the service should be removed.
He told the meeting: “Consultation counts for little in this authority.”
Councillor Mosley said he was making a plea for any savings to be used for enforcement against fly-tipping and CCTV surveillance.
He said: “We should be involved in greater control of fly-tipping and take action against those responsible for it in a significant manner.”
Vermin
Councillor Joyce Barrow, who represents the St Oswald ward, said she strongly suspected that the 80 per cent who said the service should not be removed were business people who use the banks to dispose of commercial waste.
She said the sites attract vermin and it was “disgusting” how some of them looked.
Councillor Barrow added: “I strongly support this. I think it is money we should be using better.”
In the Oswestry area alone, there are bring banks at the Morrisons car park, Sainsbury’s car park, Gobowen Railway Station car park, Morda Village Hall, The Queen’s Head hotel car park, Stans supermarket in St Martins, Trefonen and The Punch Bowl in West Felton.
A report to the council’s cabinet said that there are established alternatives for householders in terms of kerbside recycling collections which, it says, offers environmental benefits over the bring bank system.
The bring banks are serviced by three Veolia vehicles and the report stresses that the drivers and loaders on those vehicles will be redeployed to take on work currently done by agency staff.
