DENBIGHSHIRE County Council spent almost £180,000 on remunerating staff for refuse collection in the first six weeks of its new waste system.

On June 3, the council introduced changes to recycling and waste collections, including new containers and weekly collections for recyclable materials, and the scrapping of the blue wheelie bin.

Since then, some residents have been required to separate their “dry” recycling using a new three-tier “Trolibocs”.

But the council has so far issued multiple apologies for residents across the county not having their bins collected on time since June 3.

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Costs of the first weeks of Denbighshire's new waste system revealed

Yesterday (August 5), a Freedom of Information (FOI) request revealed that, from June 3 to July 14, the council paid staff £179,264 for refuse collection agency staff.

A council spokesperson added: “We cannot say to which area of the service they were specifically working.

“These costs relate just to the waste service as a whole, but we cannot distinguish between garden waste, recycling, trade waste, etc.”

Last week, the council’s response to an FOI request also revealed that, in the first couple of weeks of the new system, 30 to 40 per cent of rounds did not finish on time.

Though, the council added that this is “expected for a service change” and “has now improved”.

The council also said that, on average, 10 to 15 members of staff per day from departments other than refuse collection have taken on refuse collection shifts since the new system started.

This is said to have reduced to less than five as of July 24.

Another FOI request last week revealed that, between June 3 and July 25, a total of 15,607 complaints were logged with its customer services system regarding the new waste collection system.

The council introduced the following temporary measures in June:

  • Bringing in additional refuse collection vehicles and staff, so more crews are out each day.
  • Putting in place extra shifts so that crews can stay out longer.
  • Having crews out on Saturdays, focussing on key areas which had been missed.
  • Re-deploying staff from other council services to help with tasks to support the front-line collection crews.