What is Happening to our Waste Contract?

9.00.00am UTC (GMT +0000) Mon 7th Nov 2005

Lib Dem Councillors have been trying to find out what is happening with the new Waste Collection and Street Cleansing Contract but calls for information have not yet been met with answers.

Back in September, Liberal Democrat Councillors challenged the Council's decision to appoint a new contractor to take over both the Waste Collection and Street Cleansing in this borough for a period of 12 years. Lib Dems raised several important issues; they cited research that suggested the new contractor may lead to escalating costs and slipping standards and raised concerns about the failure to guarantee that cleansing workers would receive a 'living wage' when they transferred to the new contractor .

The Labour Group rejected this challenge and ploughed on with the original decision. Lib Dems were told that the negotiations must go ahead as there were only 8 weeks to complete them. However, 9 weeks later there is still no news on these negotiations, no reports on when the new contractor will take over and no information about the current contract and what will happen when it ends.

Cllr Janet Ludlow, Leader of the Liberal Democrat Group said "This is really very worrying. Councillors have not been told what will happen when the current contract ends. People are deeply concerned about what this will mean for their services and cleansing workers are anxious about their jobs. We don't know if negotiations have been completed, what this will mean for our borough and how much it will end up costing us. What a shambles! Sort it out!"