Council approves new garden waste collection chaege

At a special meeting broadcast live on the council’s YouTube channel, councillors voted to for the charge by 27 votes to two, with four abstentions.

The charge will generate funds to offset the cost of the new waste and

recycling service, which is set to rise by £1-million a year to maintain service levels for Dales residents with the continuation of weekly food waste collections, together with collections fortnightly of dry recycling and fortnightly of residual household waste that can’;t be recycled or composted.

The cost for garden waste collections will be £50 per bin per year - the

equivalent of £1 a week - with an early bird offer of £35 on purchases made before January 31, 2021.

Residents will have to opt in to the service and will not be obliged to take part.

Local councils do not have a legal responsibility to collect garden waste, but until April 2021 the service will continue to be free of charge for all 34,000 households in the Derbyshire Dales.

At the same meeting, councillors also voted overwhelmingly to approve that current contractor Serco continues to deliver the Derbyshire Dales’ waste and recycling contract from August 2020..

The cost of the current waste collection contract is £2.1 million per year – on average around 75p per household per week – but will rise to £3.1 million for the new contract.

Councillors heard that the cost of the new contract is significantly more expensive than the current arrangement because it was tendered at a time when the market was more buoyant and contractors enjoyed higher prices for the recyclable materials they collected.

However, vehicle prices, fuel costs and wage bills have also risen substantially since the contract was last tendered.

Coun Garry Purdy, council leader, said: “I want to thank the officers - it’s been a long journey and an awful lot of work has been done.

“This is one of the most important services this authority provides and we have a high reputation.”