Pat Regan: Ainsdale Green Bin Collection Woes

Ainsdale’s LibDem councillor Lynne Thompson has written to Sefton Council about green bin complaints. Her memo (as below) is being widely shared on social media.

Ainsdale Green Bin Complaints - Communication Sent To Sefton Council Head of Service.

‘I am contacting you about the extremely poor communication regarding the decision made to bring forward last Green Bin collection scheduled for 29th November.

While I fully appreciate the reasons behind the decision, I believe the chaos that has ensued could have easily been avoided with a little more thought about communication.

I received an email on 14 October informing me of the decision made and that public would be advised via usual channels. The usual channels appear to be Sefton website, social media, and local press. Sadly, this has proved woefully inadequate (evidenced by the amount of emails, Facebook messages and telephone calls I have received in the last 10 days).

I did contact your dept earlier on for clarification. It was agreed a Mop Up operation would be in place for those residents who had registered a missed collection online or via Council helpline. I understood this operation would run for 5 days. I passed this information on to residents who had contacted me to complain. I also posted same on social. media.

However, to add to the general confusion residents have now contacted me confirming Council Helpline advice is to leave Green bin out and they will ALL be collected. So areas of Ainsdale continue to be littered with a plethora of green bins.

Would it not have been more efficient and cost effective for crews to sticker each Green Bin on the last collection day confirming final collection for 2021 now complete? The Council have done this in past, a proven effective method of communicating change. I would be interested to hear your comments and some clarification on the correct information to impart to residents.

Take them in or leave them out?’

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