Wheelie Bins Arrive – And So Do The Complaints

This afternoon the wheelie bins arrived in my road, and of all the houses in the road they could have picked, the men delivering them picked my house to line them all up across the drive while they put the wheels on them all, inserted the pods etc. At least it gave me a good view of the proceedings. I now know how you put the wheels on a wheelie bin!

Wheelie Bins Minus Their Wheels

The bins were then wheeled off down the road, and it wasn’t long before the first complaint came in – shock at the size of the tiny paper pod in the small recycling bin. (It’s bad enough in the normal size bin, but believe me in the small bin, it is a complete joke!)

I understand some people in Brandwood tried reversing their recycling so that the paper went in the larger bottom bit of the container, and the plastics and cans in the smaller pod. That arrangement would certainly suit our household better because the bottles section in the recycling wheelie bin is so large, and the paper section so small – which is the opposite of what we want. However it is absolutely not allowed and since the accompanying leaflet threatens legal action if residents repeatedly get things wrong, I certainly shan’t be doing it.

Meanwhile I see a Birmingham Labour blogger is moaning because I complained about the amount of money the Labour Council has spent advertising something which is going to happen anyway.

Of course there need to be leaflets giving information about the change – though these have not been as clear as they should be. This was obvious when this week in Harborne, we had the special triple collection, (which is what you get if your recycling weeks are swopping over when you change to wheelie bins). This week it should have been green waste in my area, but we had a note about a special triple collection – where we could put out green, paper and multi. It was interesting driving home last night to see how many people hadn’t picked up on this and had just stuck with putting out only their green waste.

However my real complaint is the fact the Council is not just giving people instructions about the changes, but has also hired a PR company which specialises in “crisis media advice”. I have asked specifically what this company is being paid to do – and I have been told that they are taking “before” and “after” pictures in Brandwood and Harborne, and finding people in those wards to interview, all of which will then be published (I believe in The Forward) no doubt to try and prove what a wonderful success the wheelie bins have been.

That is not giving information to people about how the new system works. In my opinion that is an attempt to try and get the Labour Council some good publicity. If a Labour Councillor thinks that is a good use of tax payers money, then so be it – but at a time when the Council has axed black bags, green bags and is threatening to mothball or close some leisure centres, I do not agree with him. And I suspect many members of the public will not agree with him either.

 

Operation Scarlet

Tonight I’ve been out on patrol with the police as part of Operation Scarlet.

Operation Scarlet is a police initiative in parts of Edgbaston and neighbouring wards – making sure street prostitution stays out of our area.

This was a big problem in the past and a number of joint initiatives took place over the years between the police, residents and councillors, which have much reduced it.

However everyone is anxious that the problem does not reappear. So the police are carrying out a big policing initiative in the area to make sure kerb crawlers and their clients know it is not an acceptable place to visit for the purposes of street prostitution.

It was interesting to go out on patrol tonight, partly as I am an Edgbaston Ward Councillor, but also because of my new role as Shadow Cabinet Member for a Green, Safe & Smart City.

Broad Street To Close In To City

At yesterday’s Transport Scrutiny Committee I managed to prise out the information (which was not prominent in the presentation) that during the six weeks the tunnels are closed for major works (mid July to Sept 2nd) the top of Broad Street will also be closed to in to city traffic.

This is a major route in to town for people travelling into the city from the West – from places such as Halesowen, Bearwood, Quinton, Harborne and Edgbaston, but information about this major closure has been sadly lacking from Birmingham’s Labour Councillors.

Indeed when the matter was raised on Radio WM this morning, the Labour Deputy Leader Cllr Ian Ward had to admit he didn’t know about it.  Which does rather look like incompetence by the Labour administration.

You can hear the whole interview with me and Cllr Ward on the Radio WM website (listen again section, Nick Conrad’s show Saturday morning). The interview stretches from approximately 10.50 to 11.10 with a break for the 11.00am news. The story can also be seen on the Birmingham Mail website.

Black Bags Or Swimming Pools?

My written question, & Cllr Robert Alden’s written question, to Full Council yesterday revealed that so far £29,206 has been spent by Birmingham publicising the introduction of wheelie bins in the city. Three companies have been hired to help arrange this publicity – Service Birmingham, Dyson Media Ltd, & Amey PLC.

Hot on the heels of this information, the Birmingham Mail today published an article with the arguments for and against wheelie bins – put by the Cabinet Member Cllr James McKay and me, as his Shadow.

It’s well known of course that the Labour administration has stopped the distribution of black bags for household waste – leaving 38 wards in the city (not the pilot wheelie bin wards) still on a black bag system – but with no black bags provided. Cllr McKay is quoted in the article as saying “If you want bin bags, show me the libraries and swimming pools you would close to fund them.”

In my opinion he really is going to have stop using this argument now that the Labour leader of Birmingham City Council (his boss)  announced last week that those leisure centres which couldn’t be rebranded as well-being centres, and couldn’t attract a private sector partnership, or be part of a community asset transfer, would be moth-balled or closed. (See previous post.)

It clearly ISN’T a case of losing your bin bags but keeping your leisure centres. Under Labour, Brummies in at last some parts of the city now face losing both.

Well-Being Centres

Yesterday I attended the first official meeting of the Health & Well-being Board (previously it was a Shadow Board). It was my first, and last, meeting as I have changed from being Shadow Cabinet Member for Health & Well-being to Shadow Cabinet Member for Green, Safe and Smart City. My successor at the Shadow Health portfolio will be Cllr John Lines when he has ceased being Lord Mayor on June 11th.

There were some interesting items on the agenda (such as childhood obesity), but we didn’t discuss Labour’s big idea of the moment which is to turn our existing Leisure Centres into Well-being Centres which would also offer smoking cessation advice, weight management services, health checks etc. etc.

Interestingly this announcement was made just hours after the Health & Well-being Board met.

The Labour idea is that public health funding would be used to support and deliver sport and physical activity, but there will need to be a demonstrable impact on public health priorities and outcomes of course.

The alternatives (according to Labour) are contracting out sports and leisure facilities to external management, third sector/community asset transfer, or moth-balling or closing facilities “due either to the state of the building or there being no potential to tackle health inequalities with re-direction of budget”.

The latter doesn’t really surprise me. Labour have form over closing leisure facilities. Last time they were in power they closed the Monument Road swimming pool (which served Ladywood and North Edgbaston) without ever replacing it.

In the Edgbaston constituency we only have one major Council leisure facility – the Harborne Pool and Fitness Centre, which is already being run by a partner agency, DC Leisure, so I presume these plans will not affect us as much as other constituencies.

Green Carded Houses Which Don’t Seem Suitable For Wheelie Bins

I suspect there are many residents across the city who have been reassured by the Council’s promise that if their house is not suitable for a wheelie bin, they won’t have to have one.

Today I was invited to take a look at some terraced houses whose occupants know only too well that what the Labour Council classes as unsuitable for a wheelie bin, and what they class as unsuitable for a wheelie bin is not the same thing at all.

The residents live in terraced properties in Harborne. They were assessed in the spring, and will be getting their wheelie bins in the next couple of weeks as Harborne is a pilot ward.

These particular terraces have a passageway leading to the rear of the properties which is shared by 12 houses. Six to the left, and six to the right. If you lived in the end one of these therefore, and you kept your wheelie bin at the back of your property, on bin day you would have to wheel EACH of your wheelie bins past the back of 6 houses, down the passageway, and then along the fronts of 6 houses to get it outside your own property. That’s up to 36 wheelie bins being moved along the shared passageway on bin day – it could become quite a traffic jam.  The passageways also have pipes in them, and if they are damaged, residents are liable.

It seems the Council has assumed these residents won’t keep their wheelie bins at the back of their properties, because they have admitted they have assessed the properties on whether or not there is space at the front to store the wheelie bins.

Each of these Victorian terraced properties has a small front garden, which is the width of the house  (front door and reception room with bay window), and about 8′-10′ deep. Those who have laid out the whole plot to garden (so would have to store the wheelie bins on their flowers or grass) have been given red cards (only after a fight in some cases as the original assessment was done in the snow and the assessors couldn’t see if the frontages were garden or paving so assumed there was somewhere to store bins when there wasn’t always.)

Those who have some paving in the front garden have been green carded, on the basis that they can store the wheelie bins on their frontage. In some cases this will have to be directly in front of the bay window – but the Council appears to care not. They have been green carded, and two wheelie bins they will get.

The road is very attractive, with hedges and nicely maintained front gardens (whether they’re paved with bushes, pots or whatever, or laid to lawn and flowers).  Soon the fear is it will resemble a sea of wheelie bins – with two in each small front garden (three in some once the green wheelie bin system comes in next year), and the prospect of people having to look out of their front bay windows straight onto their wheelie bins.

What is the alternative? To store the bins permanently on the pavement? One resident asked at the Harborne Wheelie Bin Roadshow if he could do this, and was told he could be fined if he did.

Not surprisingly, the residents I spoke to this morning are upset about it – and I can see why. I wouldn’t want to have my wheelie bins permanently stored directly outside, and covering part of, my lounge window. There is a large amount of terraced housing in Birmingham, and I foresee this scenario repeating itself endlessly over the coming months – with a lot more people feeling as angry as the Harborne Residents I met with this morning.

Wheelie bins in front garden at Bournbrook. Soon we shall see this in Harborne too.

The Day Which Doesn’t Exist!

I have just gone to write a meeting in my Council diary for Friday July 26th – only to find that according to the official Council diary, that date doesn’t exist this year!

The diary page is printed with Thursday July 25th and Friday July 25th before moving on to Saturday July 27th!

I’m used to Council diaries which break at the spine at the slightest rough handling, and one year the diaries were printed starting on the wrong day of the week as I recall – but I don’t think we’ve ever lost a day before!