Tories vow to restore weekly bin collections

OLDHAM council will be told to bring back weekly rubbish collections if the Tories win power — with cash incentives on offer to help them do so.

Eric Pickles, the party’s local government spokesman, condemned Gordon Brown’s “bullying” which had led many councils to empty bins just once a fortnight.

Oldham Council gave the go-ahead in March for bin collections to be made fortnightly.

Chadderton and Shaw currently run the system of collecting household rubbish one week and recyclable materials the next.

More of the borough will join the scheme in February, with it rolling out across the whole borough by May.

Mr Pickles said the fortnightly move was unpopular with residents and had led to increased fly-tipping, rubbish rotting in the streets, bad smells and an increase in rats.

He said: “Gordon Brown is making it increasingly hard for families to throw away their waste responsibly. Councils are getting the blame for policies imposed by Whitehall.

“Conservatives believe that decent rubbish collections are a vital front-line council service to help protect the local environment and public health.

“We reject Labour’s approach of state bullying, cutting services and higher taxes.

“We will provide funding for those councils that wish to introduce proper weekly rubbish collections, on top of comprehensive recycling services.”

The Tories said once-a-week household rubbish collections came into law in 1875 to stamp out cholera and other plagues which claimed huge numbers of lives.

The new policy would allow councils to stick with fortnightly collections, but — with cash on offer — it would be electoral suicide to do so, the party believes.

With the average cost of weekly collections standing at £59.80 per household per year, compared to £44.63 for fortnightly ones, it would cost £121m to switch back everywhere, it has calculated.

The Tories plan to raise £133 million by scrapping unelected regional assemblies, a number of inspectorates, Labour’s new planning quango and by forcing councils to spend less on promotion.