Chairman's Blog - Nov 2017

RUBBISH COLLECTION

So far as we know, the present administration on Merton Council - if re-elected next May - intend to press ahead with fortnightly collection of household rubbish only, and the introduction of wheelie bins.  This is despite what I believe to be the almost universal local opposition to the ending of the weekly service which has operated successfully for many years.

It is also even though in 2011 the Government’s Communities Secretary pledged to restore the “fundamental right” to weekly bin rounds and provided £250million to local authorities to help them supply them!

But, according to a recent report in The Times, too few councils took up the offer, with many saying that it was too expensive to maintain weekly collections, or that doing so would undermine their efforts to reach an EU target of recycling 50 per cent of waste by 2020.

The theory behind this is that fortnightly collections will aid the collection of goods that can be re-cycled. However, Merton is well behind its own target, and nationally the rate of re-cycling had gone down in 2015 from the figure of 44.9 per cent in 2014. 

Speaking personally, I see no connection between reducing the frequency of general rubbish collection, and increasing the rate of re-cycling. On the contrary, I foresee that reducing the frequency of collections will encourage overflowing bins and so vermin, and cause foul smells.  I see the reduction in weekly collections as simply being cost cutting in a service that every household requires and depends upon.

However, this may be a battle that is already lost nationwide. Nationally non-recyclable waste is collected once every week in only 24 per cent of local authorities and six councils only collect it once every three weeks. 

MORDEN PARK SWIMMING POOL

Morden Park swimming pool was opened in 1967. It is now being replaced with a Leisure Centre which will have a 25-metre, six lane main pool plus a second pool, and with a fitness suite and cafe. Work has already started on the construction, and the new building is scheduled to open in the autumn of 2018.   It is said that it will cost less to maintain than the former pool, which will be demolished, and the site returned to green space. The present pool and all its facilities will remain open until the new leisure complex is complete.

John Elvidge (Chairman)