Have we all fallen down a rabbit hole?

I received a copy of an email that Ken Wilson sent to Councillor O’Brien, who seems to be the only councillor who is doing anything to resolve this the problem of wheelie bins. Anyway, the last paragraph of the email is copied below and for the life of me, I am struggling because someone isn’t living in the real world. Perhaps it is us lowly peasants who are all wrong, or perhaps it is the NLC official who are deluding themselves into believing their own Jackanory statistics.

Extract from Ken Wilson’s email:

“… In relation to the 27 households in Westfield that are currently dissatisfied with their blue bin, this matter will be addressed shortly and further attempts will be made to contact the 9 outstanding households which have requested the removal of their blue bin to clarify their position…”

So according to these statistics, in the whole of Westfield, there are only 27 who are dissatisfied and just 9 who want them taken away. Of course when it comes to statistics we all believe North Lanarkshire Council, don’t we? It’s not that they tell fibs to get their own way is it? It’s not that they treat our elected officials with total disregard is it? Ask any one of them, from any political party, about wheelie bins and see if they believe the NLC figures that there is 27 ‘dissatisfied’ people in Westfield.

Me thinks we are getting the Bums Rush again!

If you are not happy then for goodness sake complain in writing and send a copy to the Community Council. Rose Cadden is the secretary her email is :

rosecadd1.wcc@blueyonder.co.uk

 

 

Official Complaint Procedure

If you are unhappy at the lies, guile, service or behaviour of NLC employees then I have been advised that the official complaints procedure is the way forward. If you have been landed with an unwanted wheeled bin then a letter to NLC Environmental Services Department demanding its immediate uplift is required. According to the Environmental Services report of 27^th February Mr Barry McCulloch approved the implementation of the programme. However, within the report of the committee it clearly states that residents have a choice. Therefore, we do not need to accept wheeled bins. It does also mean that recycling duties may fall on us for our decision but personally that is something I already do and I know that you do also.

Telephone Chief Executives office and ask for a copy of their Complaints Procedures to be posted to you. The telephone number is: 01698 302718

To have their wheeled bin taken back contact:

Customer Services Assistants
NorthLine Environmental
52-60 Merry Street – Motherwell – ML1 1LZ
01698 403110
environmental@northlan.gov.uk

Below is an extract from the Minutes, Agendas and Reports from North Lanarkshire Council’s Environmental Committee which Councillor Barry McCulloch is part of. It was this committee that approved Ken Wilson’s Report.

****** ENVIRONMENTAL SERVICES COMMITTEE 27 February 2008 Agenda item 7 ******

3 Proposals/Considerations [Bold mine]

3.1 In devising the resubmission to the Scottish Government, the Department took advice from Remade at Caledonian University on the best fit of proposals that would work within the North Lanarkshire environment and housing types. It was clear from this consultation that there would need to be a tailored approach to implementing schemes with no “one size fits all” being possible. The proposals therefore identified ways of providing all residents with the means of participating in recycling by providing appropriate facilities whilst at the same time ensuring best value.

3.4.4 Appropriate property surveys have now been completed throughout the Authority and having identified properties where it is impractical to provide this service, alternatives will be provided …

3.4.6.6 Recycling Containers will be made freely available to those householders who have up to now decided not to participate in the schemes. It should be noted that no additional (residual) collections can be provided to any resident who chooses not to participate during the recycling week but every effort will be made through educational and advisory methods to encourage participation

As you can see NLC failed to acknowledge previous findings that Westfield Cumbernauld was considered impractical for wheeled bin implementation. I refer to MSP Hugh O’Donnell’s letter.

The Fight is Not Over Yet!

Well wheelie bins were issued this morning in the lower part of Westfield.

This fight is not over. A public meeting is to be held within the Community Halls in Westfield on Monday 6^th April 2009 at 7.30pm. I would advise that you attend. Hopefully I will have discovered who has backed this and who has stayed silent.

I have contacted Cathie Craigie’s office and they say that she is 100% behind the residents of Westfield in her opposition to wheeled bins. She has asked for a meeting with NLC. I also spoke to her administrative assistant and she informed me that NLC told Councillor Chadha that the issue of wheeled bins would not be going ahead until after NLC had met with our elected officials. Well guess who is telling porkies again?

I have also contacted Allan O’Brien who was an unhappy man this morning and has arranged a meeting with NLC officials for later this week.

I am still waiting for Councillor McCulloch to respond on this issue, I just wonder what his silence means?

I appreciate the support from our elected members but I want to see some action.

It doesn’t take Einstein to realise that Wheelie bins are not the answer in Westfield but NLC are Hell bent on imposing them, so much so that they will stoop to deplorable depths of dishonesty and guile. If recycling was the issue then I am positive that we could have sat round a table and come up with a workable solution. But no, NLC want everything their own way and stuff the local residents. Now, normally I would be campaigning for the heads of our elected members but at present I do not know who has backed this initiative. I have been told that it was unanimously supported by the ruling group within the council. I have therefore written to Councillor McCulloch, who so far has been silent on this matter, to let me know before the public meeting. I do sincerely hope that it is only the unelected jobsworths employed within NLC and their senior management that are behind this situation. However, when I find out I will let you know.

I spoke to :o) the NLC employees who were issued with orders last week to deliver these bins to our houses and they told me that the grey ones are also being delivered. What I would love to know is – Who is in Charge here? NLC have again misled our councillors and also misled our MSPs. I will also be contacting the Scottish Public Services Ombudsman for their advice.

Not Everyone Is Opposed

We have had a comment from LM who is in favour of Wheeled Bins and I thank them for that and I can fully understand their position. We know and accept that there are a few households in Westfield where the use of wheeled bins is perfectly acceptable. They have the storage and the point of presentation. In fact when NLC asked if they could survey the residents and seek permission, the Community Council had no objections as long as NLC did two small things:

1. Operated their service as stated within their procedures and policies. Having two or three bins in each street is not a problem as long as NLC return them to the point of presentation and that they do not block paths or walkways. Unfortunately NLC have never managed to do this but instead abandon the bins causing potential hazards to our children, pensioners and disabled residents. NLC operatives have consistently left the bins at the path edge and in our car parks. Almost every area in Westfield is a grassed cul-de-sac so they don’t have kerbsides. Just taking as an example the problems for our children, kids walking to school have to manoeuvre around these abandoned bins and cannot see or be seen by vehicles entering or leaving our car parks. Delivery vans not aware of the problem are suddenly faced with bins as they round a corner so swerve to avoid it. Unfortunately they don’t see the child, or the pensioner, or any pedestrian as they have no choice but to walk through the assembled barrage and across the car park. Fortunately we have not had an accident yet but we only have a small number of bins per street. Imagine what the path ends or the car park would look like with 30 assembled waiting to be emptied or collected at the end of the day. The only point of presentation that is possible for the majority is the end of our front paths as anywhere else will affect public safety. This issue is already identified in Safer Pathways on NLC’s own website. They know there is a problem and they know that they don’t have a suitable answer that does not compromise the safety and security of our residents. However, if you read their policies and procedures, once you have accepted a wheeled bin then the responsibility for safety of the residents falls on you. They can abandon it anywhere they like but if an accident should happen because it is your bin it is your responsibility. Even if someone steals it, it will cost you £60+ to replace it. Why do you think that they are pursuing this issue so aggressively?

    

2. The second issue that we requested they solve is – Where do people who don’t have anywhere to store the bins, store them? It is ok for some in Westfield as they have a place to store a wheeled bin and perhaps two. But not everyone has. Eleven years ago Westfield Community Council, MSPs, Councillors and NLC officials walked round Westfield looking at this very problem. The conclusion was that Westfield was unsuitable for wheeled bins. (see MSP Hugh O’Donnell’s letter to Gavin Whitefield NLC Chief Exec. in the comments field). So what has changed? Nothing. Westfield is unsuitable for wheeled bins and no amount of lying, cajoling, bullying or harassment can change that.

I’ll be frank, yes some of us do have a place to put one or two bins so our main concern is the return to point presentation (point 1 mentioned above). However, there are a lot of householders who don’t have anywhere to put even one wheeled bin. Therefore should NLC be allowed to foist their ill thought out solution on these people?

When it comes to recycling then almost every person in Westfield is strongly in favour of it. That is why the majority of us, who can, trundle to Wardpark on a regular basis. But wheeled bins are not the solution. Not when they create such significant risk and distress to many of the residents of Westfield. Westfield Community Council have long been supporters of recycling. We recognised that there was a problem for those who couldn’t get to Wardpark which is why the recycling bins were placed in the small car park next to the shop. Unfortunately, they lasted five minutes before vandals set fire to them and NLC removed them. We support the recycling unit being built in Westfield Industrial Estate. We have supported garden uplifts for years right up until NLC decided that it wanted to stop it. NLC introduced a recycling service a few years back and failed to pick up the bags and boxes. They blamed the contractor but NLC were in charge, or should have been. This is not a recycling issue. This is an issue that affects the health and wellbeing of our residents. This is an issue of fortnightly uplifts with nowhere to safely store the decomposing waste. This is an issue of attracting vermin into our kitchens and gardens. This is an issue of dragging two week old filthy waste through our homes. This is an issue that affects us all.

Am I being melodramatic? Make up your own mind but first check out the following articles:

In the Sun Newspaper – The UK is facing an epidemic of RATS of plague proportions. Edinburgh is already being hit by a sevenfold increase and overflowing bins are being highlighted as the main cause.

http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/article757835.ece accessed 23rd March 2009

 

Daily Record 29^th September 2008 – SCOTLAND’S capital is in the grip of a rat epidemic – with pest controllers reporting a seven-fold rise in callouts.
Experts blame overflowing bins caused by a decrease in collections and they say Edinburgh’s rat population could spiral out of control.

 

Or the 21^st Century Plague spread by Rat Fleas. – Bacteria that can cause serious heart disease in humans are being spread by rat fleas, sparking concern that the infections could become a bigger problem in humans. Research published in the December issue of the Journal of Medical Microbiology suggests that brown rats, the biggest and most common rats in Europe, may now be carrying the bacteria.

                    http://current.com/items/89558279/scientists_discover_21st_century_plague.htm accessed 23rd March 2009

Wheeled Bins are not a new issue. This is a long standing concern hat NLC refuses to address. Many, reading this will know that it has already been directly linked to the death of Councillor Coombe. In fact when I recently mentioned it to Mr H Frew of NLC his comment was that Councillor Coombe had heart troubles anyway. So if you are ill, young, old or weak then NLC don’t seem to give a damn. NLC know the depth of feeling about this and yet they also try to cloud the issue by claiming it is a cost saving, or an environmental, or a moral, or whatever invalid reasons they can muster. Then when that doesn’t make an impression they make up false figures and expect the good people of Westfield to accept them. 

LM mentioned in their comments about the statistics and data that I referred to in my last posting as perhaps being wrong. Their comment was that perhaps NLC were using data collected during the wheeled bin request letter from last year. The only thing I can say is that, no it doesn’t. Councillor Chadha knocked on doors yesterday to validate the NLC figures as he needed proof that NLC had tried to dupe him. He now has that proof. However, it doesn’t help their case when NLC employees can’t even count the houses correctly. The data I referred to was a spreadsheet that was sent to Councillor Chadha following our complaint at the disrespect portrayed by Mr K Wilson’s men under the supervision of Mr H Frew.

NLC have destroyed our trust and they have lied to elected officials. So I thank LM for their comments and I would love to say that NLC had behaved impeccably in their dealings with the residents of Westfield but I cannot. LM’s experiences with NLC have been positive and therefore valid but I do believe they are in a minority.

This is not something that can be taken lightly. NLC need to know that the introduction of Wheeled Bins into Westfield is unworkable and compromises the health and wellbeing of the residents. Do not accept their protestations and false claims. Get out and make your voice heard. We hope to have a public meeting on this but please do not let this slide, otherwise we will all pay the price.

Wheelie Bin Update 21/3/09

And the carnival rolls on. I got a telephone call from Councillor Chadha this morning. What he said was that if he is allowed to, he will try and bring this matter up at the Labour Group meeting on Monday. However, before then he wants to meet with me to see if we can discuss a way forward, as we do need to resolve this matter. How can we resolve a matter when we believe the other party are going to lie to us? I wish him luck with the Labour Group but this in not a political problem. This is about heavy handed bullying by people who do not care about our community. We do have other Councillors in our area who do not belong to the Labour Group and they have also been very supportive. Therefore, I do not want them excluded from the discussions and I’m afraid that is what might happen if the Labour Group are given carte blanche on this matter. Apart from that – this is an IF. The Labour Group already has an Agenda for Monday’s meeting and I just don’t want to take the risk that this issue might be shelved. As I said, I wish councillor Chadha the best of luck in getting this issue added to the Agenda and I sincerely hope that the Labour Group back our community.

There was one other thing that Councillor Chadha mentioned, that made my jaw drop. Seemingly Paul Dukes, K Wilson’s boss, said that he accepted Mr K Wilson’s figres as an accurate reflection of the situation in Westfield. These are the same figures that have miscounted the number of houses in Westfield. These are the same figures that in Netherwood Road there are 8 houses and in reality there are 9. By the way there are 10 streets where they couldn’t even count the number of houses correctly and these are the same people who operate our services. I mean who has a position of managing a service and cannot count to 10? But why would Paul Dukes accept these same figures as accurate. The whole thing is a joke and not a funny one at that.

North Lanarkshire Council have betrayed our trust and I struggle to see how they will ever win it back again.

In the meantime. I suggest that you make up a poster and put it in public view. NO WHEELIE BIN!

Wheelie Bins Update

Well what a furore. I think almost everybody in Westfield are up in arms at the carry on of North Lanarkshire Council. NLC officials have lied to us, they have lied to MSPs and to Councillors. Just recently Councillor O’Brien was told that NLC Cleansing Department were not going to impose their wheeled bin service. I would love to be a fly on the wall at their next meeting because when I spoke with him today he was none too pleased at being put into a potentially compromising position. The word ‘compromising’ is my translation of the actual words he used.

Want a laugh? Actually it isn’t funny but sad. NLC representative Mr K Wilson sent Councillor Chadha a copy of his data collection. Seemingly his men had knocked on a selection of doors within Westfield and asked if we wanted a wheeled bin service. He then produced the statistics. Well, in my street alone there were 16 householder were asked and 16 accepted a wheeled bin. 100% acceptance. Only problem was that my door was knocked and Mr Hugh Frew of NLC said “here is your free DVD and leaflet. By the way you will be getting a Blue bin next week.” The conversation lasted about 45 minutes but the gist was that he could stick his Blue Bin in the same compromising position that Councillor O’Brien found himself in, if you get my meaning. Seemingly telling NLC representatives where to stick their bins is the same as accepting it. However, that isn’t the end of it, if you forgive the pun. Councillor Chadha sent me a copy of the data that said I was willing to accept a bin. When I looked at the data, NLC representatives had miscounted the houses. There are 29 houses in my street but they counted 33. In fact out of 24 streets they counted 10 of them incorrectly. Then think that we are stupid enough to not notice. Their information falls at the first hurdle. They didn’t even need to count the houses, as that is probably too much effort, the number of houses are on the internet. If they had bothered to check their own Council Tax data then they would see that. I’m sorry but despair at their ineptitude.

So what is happening? Well almost everyone is now involved. Councillor Chadha is going to talk to some people in the hope of a solution. He’s a nice man, not judgemental like me. Councillor Murray has written to Mr K Wilson because Mr K Wilson is not answering his phone. Councillor O’Brien is spitting onions and has demanded a meeting with Paul Dukes and K Wilson to find out why he feels that both he and MSP Jamie Hepburn were blatantly lied to. MSP Cathie Craigie has written to say she is on to it. MSP Hugh O’Donnell has written to Gavin Whitefield in no uncertain terms. MSP Jamie Hepburn has also written to NLC and is none too pleased at being apparently lied to over the present situation.

I want to close now with a request to visit a website. My complaint amongst other things is the use of wheeled bins in Westfield compromises community safety. It disadvantages the kids, elderly and the disabled putting their wellbeing in danger. This is not to take away from the “where do we put them argument” but check NLC’s own website on Safer Footways http://www.runurl.com/xx.php?q4z . They tell us not to obstruct the footpath with wheelie bins because it is a hazard. But it’s alright for them.

If you have any comments then please feel free to make them. Try and keep swearing out of it though :o)

Wheelie Bins – AGAIN

This could be your home next month!

WANT THEM OR NOT – YOU’RE GETTING THEM

 

North Lanarkshire Council has decided that they will be delivering a Blue wheeled bin to every household in Westfield within the next week.  Then they will follow this with a Grey bin within a fortnight after. 

I have been involved in my local community for over 20 years and I have never, in all my experience,  known of any local authority to be so blatant in their disregard and disrespect of the views and opinions of the local community.  At Westfield Community Council’s monthly meeting on 11^th March 2009, none of the NLC representatives present, Mr Ken Wilson, Mr Hugh Frew or Mr Jim Brown, made any mention of their intention to impose their dictatorial decision to issue wheelie bins on the residents of Westfield.  For many years now the residents of Westfield have resisted the issue of these bins, not because we are against recycling but because of two simple reasons:

1.    No where to store them as many of the residents do not have gardens.

2.    No where to present them as we do not have a kerbside and this results in NLC cleansing operatives abandoning them at their backside when emptied, obstructing the car parks. 

 

Two simple reasons that are within the NLC management capabilities to resolve but they are either unwilling or unable to even attempt.  Instead they send representatives to our meetings where they misrepresent the facts, disrespect the chair, insult the residents and embellish the reality to suit their own agenda.  Then when challenged they say they will be sending people around the doors to discuss and assess the implications of introducing a wheeled bin service with the residents. 

What happened?  They came round the doors and told us we would be getting a blue bin within the week.  Only when pressed did I elicit further information that the grey bin will follow and that there will be a fortnightly uplift of household waste, Blue bin with recycled waste one week and alternate Grey bin with household waste the next.  None of this was mentioned at our meeting.   

I don’t know about you but I was brought up to think that there were names for people who say they will do one thing and deliberately mislead you in the full knowledge they have other intentions.  And I am saddened to say that North Lanarkshire Council are making every effort to live up to every one of them.   

So what next?  Write to your Councillors, MSP and North Lanarkshire Council.  Let them know what you think and make your points heard. 

For details of contact numbers and addresses see Councillors and MSPs tag on this website:  https://westfield.wordpress.com