Agenda item

4.1

Brian Holmshaw raised the following questions relating to the changes to the Environmental Maintenance Services:-

(a)      In the report of the Executive Director, Place, it states ‘The service changes are proportionate and during trial the public did not notice the difference’.  No-one knew a trial was taking place, so were people looking for a difference?  Did the many voluntary litter pick groups in the City who do such brilliant work have any idea this was happening?

(b)      This is then contradicted by the comment from page 2.2.1 in the report, which says that ‘Litter picking – it is likely that residents will notice an increase in litter in residential areas due to the lower cleansing frequency’.  How can this be the case if no-one noticed during the trials?

(c)      ‘No one neighbourhood will be targeted specifically by the proposed City-wide changes – there will be no impact to the health and wellbeing of residents or change to us being an in-touch organisation’ (Section 2.1 – Corporate Plan).  Does the Council not think that cutting litter collecting would always affect wellbeing?

(d)      In paragraph 4.1.1 of the accompanying document on Street Cleaning, there is a comment that ‘The trials were successfully carried out from 13^th September to 13^th October 2016, and we have supplemental evidence from Amey’s normal cleaning cycles and customer reports that indicate most areas will tolerate some reduced cleaning’.  Where is this supplementary evidence?  Why can’t we see it?  Which areas can sustain reduced cleaning?  Which areas cannot?

4.2

In response, Phil Beecroft (Head of Highway Maintenance) stated that the Service had purposely not advertised the trial in order to gauge public reaction, and no comments or complaints had been received from residents anywhere in the City.  He stated that this approach had been adopted in connection with similar trials in the past, and had been deemed as good practice.  The comments made in the report with regard to the likelihood of residents noticing an increase in litter in residential areas due to the lower cleansing frequency, and the fact that reaction times for removing reported litter being relaxed, which could result in litter being left on the highway for longer periods of time, was simply an honest statement by the then Head of Highway Maintenance, representing his views.  Mr Beecroft stated that, due to the level of change proposed, it was not envisaged that residents would notice any major changes in terms of litter in their respective neighbourhoods.  He confirmed that the proposals represented uniform changes across the City, and were not targeted at any specific areas.