Update from Cllr Ndukwe Onuoha, Cabinet Member for Streetpride, Parks and Leisure, about food waste and bin collections:
We recognise the frustration some residents have experienced with missed collections, particularly during the early stages of the new food waste service. Please be assured we are taking this seriously and working hard to resolve the issues.
The introduction of food waste collections is a national requirement set by the Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs (DEFRA), and represents a significant change for Derby. As with any new service of this scale, there have been some initial challenges.
These challenges have been compounded by delays in receiving our full fleet of new vehicles from the manufacturer, which is a national issue also facing other councils who have introduced this service. In addition, we have not had as many full crews available as we would have preferred, due to recent staff turnover.
Despite these challenges, over 90% of households have received a food waste collection, with 195.7 tonnes collected so far demonstrating strong resident participation and good progress.
However, I appreciate that these figures are of little value if we were unable to collect your food waste. I would like to reassure you that we are taking steps to catch up on missed collections and restore the service as quickly as possible.
We’ve trained additional staff and have two additional council vehicles joining the food waste service from tomorrow. However, we are still operating with ten hired vehicles, while supply chain issues continue. This is unfortunately out of our control, but be assured that we are doing everything we can to mitigate this.
Where needed, priority will be given to food waste and black bins. This may mean temporary pauses to brown bin collections and residents may also see larger refuse collection vehicles (RCVs) being used for food waste collections - these still dispose of waste correctly and help maintain service continuity.
We will continue to keep residents updated and thank you for your continued patience and support as we embed this important new service.