Three quarters of non collections for resident’s bins in Belfast are due to parked vehicles denying access for bin lorries, City Hall statistics revealed this week.
At a special Belfast City Council committee meeting looking at city waste services, elected representatives slammed the Stormont Department for Infrastructure for failing to turn up, despite being asked to attend.
Councillors called the failure to turn up to the meeting by the Stormont department “pathetic,” and “a disgrace,” with some highlighting that the dominant reason for failed bin collections related to a problem only the Stormont department could solve - that of residential car parking.
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Officers at the special meeting of the People and Communities Committee meeting on Wednesday at City Hall revealed statistics relating to missed bin collections across the city over the last recorded 12 month period.
Street vehicles accounted for 76.16 percent of missed collections, locked entries were at 6.64 percent, street works at 6.42 percent, blocked entries at 1.97 percent, blocked streets at 0.17 percent, and “other” reasons accounted for 8.63 percent.
Council officers stressed their positive “high level” statistics for bin collections, stating that the local authority had a 98.55 percent success rate at “first time” bin collection over the period.
SDLP Councillor Séamas de Faoite proposed with support that the council send a letter to the Stormont Department for Infrastructure stating its “dissatisfaction” at its “refusal to come in.”
He said: “They are a key partner in trying to deal with these issues. We want to be proactive and work with them, which is why we have reached out and had this meeting to engage with them. I think it is unacceptable that DfI has refused to show up - it is a very large department, and there are a significant amount of staff who are involved in network planning and traffic management issues. We could have had somebody here.”
Alliance Councillor Michael Long, who originally suggested the special meeting with DfI and the police, said: “It beggars belief that with the amount of notice they were given they cannot provide a single person to attend this meeting. It is an absolute disgrace, and a slap in the face to the largest democratically elected chamber that currently operates in Northern Ireland.
“It is not good enough. It is absolutely pathetic that they cannot get someone along to this. The main cause of problems with bins is to do with parked cars in the city, particularly illegally parked cars. DfI, as well as the PSNI have got to have a role in this working together to try and find solutions.”
Green Councillor Mal O’Hara said: “This is all the more reason that we should have these various powers related to local transport, like every other city of our size across these islands.
“All members have repeatedly expressed frustrations about DfI, their lack of response and engagement. And when they do turn up to meetings, preempted with questions, they are not able to answer them when they arrive, and do not provide data, or follow up data.
“We get a daily list of missed bin collections, and how many are because of parked cars and lack of access? That’s for DfI to control, not us. It is scandalous for them not to show up this evening.”
During the committee meeting council officers listed initiatives it was pursuing and would adopt in the future to address the problem of missed bin collections. An officer said the council was engaging in “site specific” work with bin crews, local councillors and the Stormont DfI to resolve access issues, with 35 site visits having been made with DfI in the past year.
The council said it would also build up a “date driven approach to restricted access” using the “Report It” phone app to identify hot spots in the city.
Belfast council has one 18 tonne bin lorry dedicated to collection in streets with restricted access. The council says: “This has a 96.5 percent first time success rate and a detailed study has been commissioned to identify the opportunity for additional restricted access vehicles.
“This will review streets and households by waste stream, the likely success rate, and the costs and benefits of proposals.” The report is due in May.
The council adds it will “look at what other cities will do and if there are any innovative ideas for collecting from restricted access streets that could complement narrow vehicles or provide other alternative solutions including common collection points.”
A representative from the PSNI did attend the committee. Sergeant Caoimhe Bannermand told councillors: “In 2006 the Traffic Management Order came into effect which decriminalised a lot of parking and waiting offences and this then transferred the enforcement from PSNI to the DfI.
“There are still obviously offences we can issue tickets for - non-endorsable fixed penalty notices which usually carry a penalty of £30, and these don’t come with any penalty points on your licence. There are also endorsable fixed penalty notices which come with a bigger fine of £60 and do come with penalty points.”
She gave some stats covering November to December 2022 - in that period there were 116 tickets issued by the PSNI for parking offences, the majority of which were issued in the South Belfast area. 76 were issued in South Belfast, 25 in East Belfast, 11 in West Belfast, and four in North Belfast.
She said: “The three offences we issue for the most, and which are quite relevant to this forum were parking within 15 metres of a junction, parking as to obstruct access- (such as blocked driveways), and obstruction of a road by a motor vehicle or a trailer.”
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