I recently had a constituent who had hazardous asbestos on his property. He sought advice from the Authority as to how to extract the waste from his property, and he followed the advice to the letter. Having bagged the 10 bags he paid the Authority the agreed fee to remove this environmentally hazardous material from his property.
They told him that they would respond and collect the bags from the bottom of his drive. Up to that point all well and good.
Except that the bags lay there for one week, two weeks, and still no sign of the bags being picked up. Worse still on every contact with the Authority no operative could give him a clear date when the bags of waste would be collected!
Remember the fee has been paid, it is now in the Local Authorities own account.
Now I think that this is an appalling service to be offering our residents.
I have contacted the Authority and I have made my feelings very clear.
Wolverhampton City Council take the finance and we give no guaranteed date when the waste will be picked up? This is poor practice in my opinion. If you are trading or offering a service in 2016 and you enter into a contract to pick something up, You would expect it to be picked up in days, not left for weeks at a time?
I do not think that the City Council can afford to offer a substandard service in today’s day and age, and not be expected to be severely criticised for their poor performance.
I have contacted the Authority again on behalf of my constituent. They admit it is not as good a service! They promise me that they will “be looking to improve this along with other changes to the service linked to the current ongoing review”
I have informed the City Officials that I think this service should be party to member’s ‘scrutiny’. I am embarrassed the City is offering such a poor service.
Officials have now indicated today that the “The Vibrant and Sustainable City Scrutiny Panel will be considering the Waste Service proposals as part of the consultation process and would be happy for asbestos collections to be raised as part of that discussion if that would be helpful”.
I certainly concur with that line of thought!
Finally – I always do my best for my constituents, I intend to follow the progress of this service forward. Currently even though it is only a very small part of all the services the City offers its citizens, its poor performance affects the City Council’s reputation.
