Michael Frank Butler
Conservative Party
Milnrow & Newhey Ward
Address
938 Oldham Road
Rochdale
OL11 2BN
I am asking the voters in Milnrow and Newhey to vote for me on 1 May because if elected I will do my best to convince Councillors of all parties to agree to bring back weekly collection of food waste. Councils up and down the country are using a government report to justify the safety of the alternate weekly collection. The report referred to is the Wycombe Report. I have read this report and it fails to convince me that no health risks are associated with leaving food to rot for two weeks close to people's homes.
The Wycombe Report was commissioned by Wycombe District Council. Wycombe District Council comprises of three medium sized towns set in the rural Chilterns, hardly comparable to Rochdale.
Researchers trawled through published articles into related issues that could arise from alternative weekly collections (AWC). This report is lengthy and runs to over almost forty pages but I would like to give a few extracts:
- “These studies indicate that waste stored for two weeks may become more odorous than waste stored for a single week” An amazing conclusion.
- “Regarding transmission of disease – flies and rodents are recognised to be a source of distribution.”
- “The reviewed literature suggests that waste stored for more than one week is likely to generate more flies than waste stored for less than one week.”
This report was not based on actual tests, unlike the report conducted by the SITA Centre at the University of Northampton. They used a standard 240 litre wheelie bin from which they took swabs over a 13 week period. They found that the level of bacteria increased over each two week cycle.
It is known that in hot weather the life cycle of the house fly is between 8 and 14 days coinciding with the 14 day collection.
Last year the summer months were unusually cool so the problem with flies and odours was not such a problem, but this will not always be the case and the Council should expect that a hot summer will bring back the problems that you had in Milnrow and Newhey the year before.
A recent group of all party MPs looking at the problem recognised that AWC was not appropriate in some urban areas and that more research into potential health risks was needed.
I call on the Labour Councillors, many of whom want weekly collections returned to press their Government to instigate a proper study and in the meantime, for the Council to come up with a scheme to collect food waste weekly.
