Plea for urgent action over 'dreadful' state of Birmingham streets

Councillor Marje Bridle (Glebe Farm and Tile Cross) made the plea during a city council meeting in which major plans to change the authority’s rubbish collection were discussed.

The Labour-run authority is set to move from weekly to a fortnightly collection of residual waste from April this year while a weekly food waste collection service and second recycling bin will also be introduced.

It says this will help taxpayers – facing a second successive council tax rise of nearly ten per cent – to more easily dispose of food waste, paper and card.

But the state of Birmingham’s streets was also a talking point during the council meeting this month.

Towards the end of last year, a council performance report alarmingly revealed that the number of reported fly-tips in Birmingham had soared by thousands and linked this finding to “budget reductions” within the authority.

On residents’ concerns over fly-tipping and litter clearance, Coun Bridle told the meeting: “I think it’s absolutely crucial that we get the street scene transformed as a matter of urgency.

“Our streets are looking dreadful.

“In my ward, and I think it’s probably the same in many wards, we have to transform that service and not just by throwing extra money at it but by making the necessary efficiency and transformation changes.

“Unless we get on with that, the public are not going to be very corporate or happy about all this other change that’s happening.”

In response, cabinet member for environment Majid Mahmood acknowledged that fly-tipping had gone up “quite significantly” and said culture change within the streets service was necessary.

“It needs to be a neighbourhood-based approach in the sense that as elected members, you can manage the service so you know which streets are being cleaned and then engage with community litter pickers,” he continued.

“That’s not been happening unfortunately.

“We did a lot of it when we had Love Your Environment... we’ve lost all of that.

“This isn’t just about the money, we need to transform the service.”

He also said they prosecute fly-tippers where they can and that there may be further details about proposed changes in April.

The fly-tipping figures were met with backlash back in December, with Liberal Democrat councillor Roger Harmer describing them as “really concerning”.

Conservative councillor Ewan Mackey added that he feared “further worsening of fly-tipping in the city as budget cuts work their way through the system”.

Addressing this uneasiness, Coun Mahmood said at the time that the loss of Love Your Environment crews had played a role.

“We are working very closely with the new enforcement hub and new targeting of CCTV of vehicle fly-tipping,” he went on to say.

“The message is clear – if you fly-tip, we will catch and prosecute you”.

On the waste collection changes, Councillor Mahmood also previously said that the council would provide residents “with a better waste collection service that is in line with other councils”.

“I know some residents are concerned about moving to a fortnightly residual waste service, but this will not be introduced until we have the food waste collections, meaning people will have less general waste,” he said.

Birmingham-specific factors, such as the Oracle system and equal pay debacles, contributed to the council’s financial crisis as did funding cuts and the rising demand for services.