Forum Topic

Fiasco of street cleaning & refuse collections

8am this morning.....the mechanical road/gutter sweeping machine is out in our streets.  Great, one would think, but, unfortunately, this was way before the refuse and recycling has been collected.  I have emailed the Council, yet again, sigh, and hope that this scheduling problem is addressed once and for all.It is an ongoing problem and it's wasting tax-payers' money.  When are they going to get this right?

Angela White ● 4737d50 Comments

In a parallel world, the mechanical road/gutter sweeping machine arrives after the refuse and recycling collected.  So the refuse collectors work faster, leaving more mess, knowing the mechanical road/gutter sweeping machine will take care of it later on that day.For any complaints that the mechanical road/gutter sweeping machine isn't doing a thorough job, leaving litter behind, they'll blame the refuse collectors for not doing their jobs properly, adding to the workload  . . . .

Fred Bray ● 4737d

I have reported this too. There is no joined up thinking. The street cleaners are employed by the recycling people and they told me who to contact in their organisation as well.

Fran Leslie ● 4737d

Oh please tell Fran.

Bob Crossley ● 4737d

Park Royal Road behind my house has pavement extensions which make most sweeping machines useless. Rubbish collects in the hidden corner, which happens to be where the drainage gullies are located. The rubbish has been there for a long time, and the gullies have not been cleaned for much longer.

Chris Bell ● 4737d

I have been repeatedly reporting missed rubbish collections to the council (one black bag has been in my privately bought black bin for 4 months plus - after all, the council refuses to give us proper bins). The latest ploy from Enterprise is that they refuse to collect from privately bought bins because there is the danger of staff members getting hurt by glass included in the bin bags. Another crazy health and safety issue that would not be an issue if staff were supplied with heavy duty leather gloves...I have contacted a local councillor, and I am so gonna kick a fuss till this is sorted. Why whould I have to clean up after the foxes that walk around my street even in daylight all the time?

Urs Esser ● 4737d

No black bags collected on goldsmith ave today. Hopeless.

Clare Gittins ● 4737d

"I have contacted a local councillor" ............. err, Good Luck with that then!!!

Rosco White ● 4737d

Urs,The bin men happily collect from my waist height black bin.  If it is higher than that they cannot look in to see what they are grabbing.  It is reasonable I think not to expect them to deal with high bins fliptop bins - these are designed to be mechanically emptied.

Phil Taylor ● 4736d

The bin men happily collect from my knee-high traditional bin as well - too happily in fact.It is placed just inside my boundary and is visible from the road (only just at the moment).They kept pulling out the untied bin bag when there was very little in it - when there were 5 of us we only made half a bin bag of landfill waste so when there are fewer it is even less.  So I've stopped using a bin bag.  When the bin is full I then tip the contents into a bin bag, tie it and leave the lid off.I think what Hounslow does is a good idea and their info on this is better.  I've looked at the Ealing website and I can't see anything about broken glass now except not to put it in the green box. (I'm sure there used to be something).What Hounslow's website says (BTW Hounslow have alternate plastic and garden waste collections) for reference only):"Household rubbishHousehold rubbish is collected every week.All rubbish for collection should be left at the edge of your property, clearly visible, before 7am on the morning of collection or as late as possible the night before.Please refer to your collection calendar for your specific collection dates.If you are physically unable to lift your rubbish to edge of your property you may be eligible for an assisted collection. Please contact us and an officer will contact you to discuss your needs.General household rubbish collection is for the day to day rubbish generated from living within the house, such as kitchen waste, food packaging, nappies etc. This does not include waste from home improvements. Garden waste will not be collected in black plastic sacks. An average of 70% of this waste can be recycled by fully using our kerbside services.We offer a weekly collection of rubbish in black sacks. All rubbish should be properly stored in large, sealed black rubbish bags. These can be purchased in any supermarket. We do not supply any type of rubbish container to our residents.You can buy your own 80 litre rubbish bin in which to store waste. Bins must be placed at the front edge of the property, clearly visible, on your collection day but not on the public highway.Please note however that we have a "lids off" policy for the collection of 80 litre rubbish bins, and we cannot be held accountable for the loss of lids following collection.Lids should either be removed or securely tied to the handle of the bin.A wheelie bin service does not operate in Hounslow.Waste presented in a wheeled bin will not be collected. This is because collections in Hounslow are made by hand and wheelie bins are not designed to be emptied in this way.How to store your rubbish for collectionReminder about how to get rid of broken glassWe would like to remind all residents that broken glass should be wrapped up and placed in the black sacks for collection.Please note: broken glass should not be placed in the recycling box. Loose broken glass placed in black sacks can cause serious injuries to the public and to our waste collection crews.There was an incident where a member of the waste collection crews suffered a serious cut requiring stitches due to unwrapped broken glass being placed out in a black sack, despite wearing protective trousers.Please wrap up broken glass securely in a newspaper and make sure that any broken glass is fully covered to prevent any injuries."It would be good if Ealing had the information on broken glass in a prominent place on their website.

Philippa Bond ● 4736d

As I understand it broken glass should be wrapped securely in newspaper, abeled broken glass and placed on top of the black sack.

Bob Crossley ● 4736d

I've emailed through the LBE website to ask where the info on broken glass is now.  It will be interesting if anything happens.  It doesn't usually.  I still really do not like the new website - it is too fragmented with no good PDFs of info.  I get the impression the website went with the new contract.

Philippa Bond ● 4736d

The service has been fairly consistently bad for all of the last 17 months that this contract has been running. This graph shows the progress that Ealing has made with street cleaning over those 17 months.  In its last year of running the contract, even when it knew it had lost the re-tendering competition, May Gurney got 88% of our streets clean first time.  Their contractual target was 90%.  At this level our street cleaning wasn’t perfect but it was good.  The Conservatives were glad that our legacy of a clean borough had been maintained.  Enterprise/Amey has had a very patchy record.  After the initial bags-in-the-street crisis of last April the service went off at the the end of last year and again this spring.  It has improved since its May nadir of 65% clean first time to 72% in August.  On average over the first 17 months of the contract 30% of Ealing’s streets have been unacceptably dirty across the whole borough every month for 17 months.  The Enterprise contract requires the contractor to get at least 95% of streets grade A clean.  The original concept of the contract was that this would happen on first clean.  Instead Enterprise has consistently only managed 70%.  There is a similar story with missed collections.  May Gurney consistently got the number of missed collections down below 1,000 per month for the last year of its contract.  Enterprise/Amey has averaged 4,000 missed collections per month over 17 months and has never got them below 2,000.  All of this leads me to question does the council really care about this?  Has it concluded that a bit rubbish is better than a lot rubbish?  Has Amey no interest in this contract?  We certainly have not heard anymore about Cllr Mahfouz’s spot checks.  Has he done any lately?  If he has they haven't achieved very much.

Phil Taylor ● 4736d

PhilMy bin is the kind of small black plastic bin that's not even waist height with a loose lid. The bin bag at the very bottom of it has been in there for more than 3 months... The bin bag at the top was ripped open by one of the Enterprise morons last week and then left - for the 2nd week running by now. They clearly did look inside the bin because the lid was lying on the ground - as always, despite a polite note on it to replace it properly so the bin does not fill up with rainwater.

Urs Esser ● 4736d

I still wonder why the collection is good in one area and poor somewhere else.It is almost as if it is being deliberately run down.  How can it be so imcompetently run as to clean the streets before the collection.  Is this a political action?

Philippa Bond ● 4735d

If there has been any political action, it would more likely have been a sweetener to persuade Ealing to drop May Gurney.

Chris Bell ● 4735d

Collecting waste from households is a science.  There are computer programmes that can plot the cheapest way of doing this.Perhaps the contractors do not have access to such programmes and the skilled people to interpret the data they produce.Seems to me that they are fire fighting.  They are collecting waste in the Goldsmith area which they should not be collecting, ie, trade waste, garden waste and much more.  All of this is going to landfill.  It must be costing Ealing Council millions, and eventually this cost will have to be passed on to you and me the Council Tax Payer.I hope the Conservatives or whoever who no doubt will replace the present Labour Councillors are prepared to pick up this mess.  They need to be interrogating the problem NOW before May.

Dee Cook ● 4734d

Dee - are you suggesting that there ARE STILL businesses who do not have contracts for their waste?

Philippa Bond ● 4733d

Well, yes.  There is always trade waste put out in parts of the Churchfield Road, for example, by lamp posts/waste bins, and on the pavement on a regular basis.  It is not placed in grey trade waste sacks.  It is collected by the Council.  So my deduction is that this trade waste is being collected free of charge.  The Council should not be collecting trade waste which is not put into grey commercial sacks.  Right/Wrong?Commercial premises pay for their rubbish to be collected by way of purchasing grey trade waste sacks.  Cardboard, I would have thought would have to be flattened and tied up and again should have a trade waste collection paid for.All commercial premises have a Duty of Care to ensure that their refuse is collected in the right and proper fashion.  This is in order to ensure that it is disposed of in the right and proper fashion.  An example would be used cooking oil.Of course businesses can employ who they wish to remove their trade waste.  But the waste in question is obvious trade waste which is not placed into other trade waste company's bags.Go walk down the Churchfield Road and take a look.  It is usually placed out at lunch time when the premises are trading (and presumably stocking up their shelves) and it is obvious where is it coming from.  It must be removed by a night time collection service because it is gone the next morning.  Black bags/supermarket carrier bags of household waste often sit side by side with the commercial waste.Other Boroughs insist that all commercial waste should ONLY BE PUT OUT FOR COLLECTION PM, at a designated time, usually half an hour before the refuse vehicle arrives to collect it.  This is an issue of enforcement - which is sadly lacking.  When did you last hear of someone being issued with a Fixed Penalty Ticket for dropping rubbish, namely beer cans, in Acton?

Dee Cook ● 4733d

Oh, and I note that someone has again started to leave their rubbish/beer cans and small vodka bottles in profusion at the junction of Goldsmith Ave and St. Dunstans Ave.The offenders urinating after drinking their beer and vodka being behind the flower beds.  Nice!

Dee Cook ● 4733d

Dee,You are quite right to point out what a mess Churchfield Road can be sometimes.  This road can and should be a showcase not an elongated rubbish tip.  The £40 garden tax has led to a big jump in flytips everywhere.  Labour halved the envirocrime team that has the job of ensuring that all businesses have commercial waste agreements.  As new businesses start they often think they can get away with flytipping their rubbish.  Other more established businesses wanting to cut costs may think they can get away with it too.  There is a growing and unacceptable bags-in-the-street culture in many areas.  As Conservative spokesman on the Environment I can say that we are well aware of these problems and we do know how to fix them.  Labour has had 18 months to fix their broken contract and still have not.  A senior officer told us last week that: "The debate at the moment is how to get this contract working properly".  Good to know that they are having an intense debate after 18 months.

Phil Taylor ● 4732d

Would you abolish the garden rubbish collection fee Phil?I just don't understand how it is enforced: once you have the green bags out for collection, anyone can take them, you ring the council for more, they are provided. But of course no-one from the collecting team is going to check whether a green bag is outside a property which has paid the fee.

Sara Nathan ● 4732d

How do you order garden bags without subscribing? I don't subscribe and I don't have any. They're not available on the EC website as far as I can see.

Clare Gittins ● 4732d

We went to talk to the police about street drinking in East Acton ward yesterday. Key areas were the footbridge linking Perryn Road and Goldsmith Road, the park across from North Acton Road and the steps between Wells House Road and Old Oak Common road. The Police are sympathetic, especially about the debris and human waste which remain after the drinkers have staggered off to their beds. They said they would be increasing their patrols of these areas and encourage you all to telephone 101 if you feel drinkers are taking over public space near you. I suppose you all know that the whole Borough is classified as a 'no public drinking zone' and they have the powers to make the drinkers pour their alcohol away if they choose to enforce the ruling. So do talk to them. It also helps if the areas have proper lighting and we have reminded the Council of the broken lights on the footbridge and steps. We have also decided to clean up the area under the steps by Goldsmith Road near by which is full of empty cans and worse. Apparently a no go area for Enterprise. On with the marigolds then!

Maire Lowe ● 4732d

Dee, the contractors are paid by the local authority to do the work. Council staff will chase them up if you report the rubbish is lying about. This happens regardless of the politics of the elected officials.

Fran Leslie ● 4732d

Some households who used the garden waste scheme last year declined this year so will still have green bags. The collection teams know which households have paid, they don't just look for any green bags. Thats the way its supposed to work anyway.

Bob Crossley ● 4732d

Fran,You are wrong about this.  There are very few areas of life where everything goes as you wish if you just let things run by themselves.  In most areas only constant vigilance ensures the result you want.  When the Tories took over in 2006 it was constant vigilance and personal leadership from the then leader Jason Stacey which transformed the Borough's streets.  More recently the same prioritisation has simply not been there.  You only have to listen to the complacent words of a senior officer.  As well as reducing envirocrime officers by 43% Labour reduced the street monitoring service by 47%.  Instead of checking about half of all streets the council only checks about a quarter.  If a street fails a check it gets put right.  The end result is that contractor only puts right half as many streets as it would otherwise.

Phil Taylor ● 4732d

Do the collection team really know? There's no evidence of that.good luck with the clean up Maire - I once spent 18 months (on and off) getting Network Rail - who have the key to the area under the bridge, which they own - to open up and remove the rotting mattresses,cans, bottle and general detritus. Even with the help of envirocrime officers, it took for ever.

Sara Nathan ● 4732d

Cut backs in public finance are decided by national government. The major expenditure in Ealing goes on Health, schools and care of the elderly. Which should lose funds to clear rubbish?Has anyone talked to our ward councillors about this problem?

Fran Leslie ● 4732d

The Acton Ward Forum is tomorrow in St Mary's church hall 1930.If you want a fun-filled evening full of laughter and joy, turn up with rubbish collection problems, or the future of the Oaks.

Sara Nathan ● 4732d

Does the Council still offer a free used cooking oil collection to businesses?Residents can now take their used cooking oil to the Reuse & Recycling Centres.This should stop a lot of problems with the drains.  http://www.ealing.gov.uk/news/article/12/ealing_slick_at_cooking_oil_recycling

Philippa Bond ● 4732d

Ha Ha, "Enforcement" - not even in Ealing Borough Council's Dictionary, so how would they know what it means??!!!

Rosco White ● 4732d

http://www.environment-agency.gov.uk/business/topics/waste/123038.aspxOn one of the pages on the Ealing website (there are far too many) you will fin Heap Oils mentioned with a tel no.  This appears to be HEP or hep oils in Harefield/Uxbridge.  If you are a business and want to find a registered oil collector (that is what they have to be - so check their registration is up to date)) I suggest you visit another Council's website eg Westminster and Brent I've noticed have more info.

Philippa Bond ● 4732d

Thanks Sara, you make it sound hard to resist. Can we get access to post offices on the agenda? The main post office in King Street needs bringing into the 21st Century (automatic doors?) and at the sub-post office on Horn Lane access is appalling.Fran Leslie

Fran Leslie ● 4732d

Fran,If you do the maths you will find that the council has lost about 12% of its income but has halved envirocrime officers and street cleaning monitoring.  On the other hand the number of senior officers has remained unchanged, the councillors still enjoy the services of political assistants and trade union facility time worth £250K is unchanged.  It is a matter of priorities and it is clear that cleaning isn't one of Labour's.  The Labour administration chose to cut back on two functions that help keep the place clean then changed the contract - result: slow burning failure with 4x as many missed collections and 30% dirty streets on average for 17 months.

Phil Taylor ● 4732d

No recycling collection in Avenue Gardens this week. Reported on line yesterday (collection day) and by phone when it was still all there on my return home today. Not holding my breath... this week or next, I wonder? And I assume I'm not the only person in the street to have reported it. If not, what does it take to get some action? If I am, it says something about how we're all fed up to the point of apathy...

Lorna Dodd ● 4731d

You go and get it on the agenda under AOB - you have to say at the beginning that you want to.But it's supposed to be about Council business and i don't think the Post Office (even pre-privatisation of the Royal Mail) can possibly count.

Sara Nathan ● 4731d

Wonder if any promises of action from the Ward Councillors will adhere to The Dear Leader's example time frames?

Rosco White ● 4731d

I am probably tempting fate here, but we have recently been very lucky with the street cleaning in Highlands Avenue.The last three weeks they have cleared up the mess left by the recycling and refuse collecting teams - even black bags- on the same day. On one occasion I spoke to a cleaner in Cumberland Road about some broken glass I had seen at the end of the alleyway, and he went and cleared it up before the street cleaning team actually got to our road! That was good service for once!It is definitely 'hit and miss' with the street cleaning and rubbish collections.

Amanda Knights ● 4730d

Next part of the rubbish saga in Allison Road...Got a letter from Ealing Council yesterday (together with a lovely photo):The area supervisor has been investigating this complaint... In this instance, we have had reportds and photographic evidence of contamination taking place. The refuse sack was contaminated with rubble and this was the reason why this was not collected.Needless to say, the bin bag containes Morrison's light weight cat litter...Wrote them an email last night, of course not heard back yet.This morning the Enterprise hooligans took a black bag I had placed on top of the mess, and apparently tried to remove the damaged bag. The bin and my front garden are now full of cat litter and poo, and the remains of the bag are hanging down half way outside of the bin.I am thinking of emptying out a bin bag full of cat litter in the foyer of the town hall...

Urs Esser ● 4730d

I had a never ending battle to get them to take a small amount of ash from my solid fuelled AGA cooker. No cat or dog mess, just ash.

Chris Bell ● 4730d

Council Leader Julian Bell and his Environment sidekick Bassam Mahfouz have Twitter accounts: @juliangbell and @BassamMahfouzI have found that tweeting complaints direct to them has been unexpectedly effective in getting some action.

Peter Millman ● 4730d

OMG - 2 people from Enterprise just turned up on my doorstep, one the apologetic manager type and the other one to muck in, so to speak. Emptied bin, cleaned it and removed every morsel of cat litter from my front garden. Have to go outside again and take another look as still cannot believe it...

Urs Esser ● 4729d

LOL.  Sit down and have a cuppa tea.  Then pinch yourself, rub your eyes and have another look!

Philippa Bond ● 4729d

At least they're trying ................ VERY trying!!!

Rosco White ● 4729d

I have posted a photo on Councillor Bassam Mahfouz' Facebook page, showing the street cleaners' truck outside my house, Thursday 3rd, with my recycling boxes and bag on my path still waiting to be emptied.

Fran Leslie ● 4729d

I am now of the opinion that our local councillors are unable to deal with this problem.  They do not have the experience or the knowledge to know what's going on and how to solve the problem.Again, we must hope that the opposition are getting themselves organised to take over all this mess and deal with it appropriately.  Making sure those who have made the mess in the first place are clearly shown up for their inadequacies.

Dee Cook ● 4728d

It is not a case of needing the opposition to get in - my local councillor (whose efforts I value) has had to ring the same 20-minute-waste-of-time number I have had to ring because the council has had to cut back on frontline staff in recent years because of funding - Tory government cuts..... Shame they don't answer your mails at all if you send them to certain 'old' addresses that used to get a result...They now want you to fill in easy forms - that's easy for them - and doesn't help any of us...

Urs Esser ● 4725d

It drives me mad when the forms are all about collecting data on me and not about what I want to tell them urgently about.I end up with www.fixmystreet.com because the map is so easy to use and pinpoint the position of the problem and the rest is easy to use too.  Anybody would think that they were trying to avoid being contacted!

Philippa Bond ● 4724d

".............  all about collecting data", yep, now you're learning.

Rosco White ● 4724d

Local Conservatives have put cleaning at the top of our pledge card.  This is the issue most commonly raised with us on the doorstep.  We cleaned up the Borough in 2006 and now we need to clean up the Borough again.  Since Labour appointed Enterprise to take over the cleaning contract two years ago in April 2012 cleaning has been broken.  It has been broken for two years and is still not fixed.  The facts are clear.  In the last full year before the previous contractor May Gurney gave up the contract they achieved a first time cleaning rate to the required standard of 88% on average.  You might have expected them to slaken off at some point knowing that they had lost the contract, but no, they did a great job until the end.  Amey/Enterprise has on average, over two years, across the whole borough left 29% of the Borough’s streets unacceptably dirty.  After two years they are just shy of the level consistently achieved by their predecessors and they are still nowhere near the required service level laid down in the contract.  The picture with missed collections has been equally dire.  In the year before May Gurney lost the contract they managed to get missed collections down to an average of 972 per month.  The average over the last two years has been 3,617, almost 4 times as many.  Amey/Enterprise has never been able to get missed collections below 2,000 per month.  Over two years an additional 60,000 calls have been made to the council to report missed collections.  To this day when you dial the council’s help desk you still get an autoresponder that says “Press 1 for a missed collection”. The Conservatives know how to clean up the Borough.  We did it before.  When we took over in 2006 Ealing wasn't just dirty - it was the dirtiest London borough. 

Phil Taylor ● 4516d