DCC spoke with a manager from GCC Cleansing to try and understand more about the arrangements for bin collections over the Christmas and Hogmanay period...
Why is it that every year some Glasgow residents don’t have their rubbish and recycling collected for an extended period over the Christmas and Hogmanay period? It’s complicated.
From the outside the easy solution is just to bump everything forward a day to account for Christmas Day and Hogmanay being the only days of the year when the collectors aren’t working.
It’s not as simple as that. Collections are organised on seven day rosters and broadly speaking, household refuse can be picked whenever needed as there are rarely obstructions. However, this doesn’t always apply to organisations generating larger amounts needing collected. Examples would be access only being available at certain times, or studies showing less general footfall or parking at a specific time, meaning these collections are fixed points in the schedule. It’s not possible for all the arrangements to be changed to a different day to accommodate the general schedule being bumped forward by a day.
The second seemingly obvious solution then becomes to use temporary staff over the Christmas and Hogmanay period in order to catch up on the missing days. This happens to a degree as staff from other Council departments are temporarily transferred to address the backlog, but their presence is dependent on other factors. If the gritting vehicles are in heavy use, staff can’t be transferred to other duties.
Hiring extra staff and paying for overtime is an option, but temporary staff are in high demand over Christmas and Hogmanay. Not only is Glasgow Council competing with every other local authority for refuse and recycling staff, they’re competing with other organisations able to offer higher wages. In recent years delivery driving is increasingly seen as a better paying option, and while Glasgow Council has a budget available, it’s not unlimited. A further factor is that in common with other employers, the winter months show the highest levels of absence due to staff sickness.
Even if everything does fall into place and temporary staff aren’t just replacing staff who’re ill, there is little spare capacity with the vehicles, which need specially trained driver operators. All vehicles are in regular use, and as with staff, Glasgow is competing against all other local authorities to hire the few collection vehicles that might be available.
None of this will be of any comfort to areas where every few years their bins aren’t emptied for an extended period over Christmas and Hogmanay, but for the moment it’s a problem without an easy answer. It is however ensured that the bins in affected areas are emptied as close to Christmas Day as possible.
After an interview during which this information was gathered, NRS were asked to check the article in case there were errors. In two months since they’ve not done so despite several reminders. Should errors be pointed out at a later stage we’ll make corrections.
Subscribe
