City council to charge £30 to remove your green bin waste

Lancaster City Council is to introduce charges for green waste collection from January next year.

Cabinet members rubberstamped the plans at a meeting on Tuesday evening.

Residents who sign up before March 31 2017 will receive the service at the discounted rate of £30 for up to a maximum of 15 months.

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After this date the service will cost £37.50 for an annual subscription until the end of March 2018. The charge will rise to £40 in 2018/19.

People will not be forced to sign up, but will have to pay for a new green bin if they ask for it to be removed by the council and later decide to take up the offer. Neighbours can share a bin and the cost if they wish.

The council says the charge is being introduced to plug a budget black hole that will see the costs of collecting household waste boom from £2.85m to £4.14m over the next few years. This is as a result of losing funding from Lancashire County Council and reductions in central government funding.

Plans to re-introduce weed spraying across the district were also given the green light at the meeting.

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Taking into account views that have been put forward, discussions have taken place with the county council and arrangements will be made so that cyclical weed spraying will resume in March across the whole district.

This includes all adopted roads and pavements and some back streets.

Hand weeding will also continue throughout winter.

Councillors praised the efforts of the public in weeding their own streets since the council weeding ceased.

“We are grateful for the work that people have done,” Coun Eileen Blamire said. “This is one of the best things we have had a rethink about and I am pleased we have been able to find the money to do it.”

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Ways of generating more income from the Vintage by the Sea Festival and Light Up Lancaster were also approved, after members agreed to cut funding by £22,000 a year earlier this year.

They will now look at ways of bringing in further income to assist the events, including further sponsorship and donations, charging for specific elements of the festival programmes, retail of quality merchandise, additional bar and catering services, concession bookings and VIP packages.