A report to be presented to Ealing Council's Overview and Scrutiny Panel this week (16th August) will give Councillors an update on waste collection and street cleaning services in the Borough.

It summarises the performance of new contractor Enterprise in their first three months and updates Members of the Council on the latest developments regarding the work implemented by Enterprise to ensure that the dry recycling and refuse collection service elements of their contract, are being delivered to the specified standard.

The number of complaints about mixed recycling collections has fallen to 1488 in June from 6818 in April but that is still well above the number for the same month last year. The report states that the indications are that recycling collection problems have continued to fall in subsequent months.

Street cleaning to the required standard has reached 75% in July from a low 53.5% in May and is expected to reach its target of 90% by September. The report claims that the current 'A' standard for street cleaning is much higher than under previous contracts.

The deployment of new vehicles in the area is described as 'predominantly successful' but the introduction of the new kerbsider vehicles and round changes has further delayed the full implementation of full post collection street cleansing. It is planned that full same day street cleaning will be in place by the end of September six months after it was supposed to happen.

In the interim, for locations that are not receiving the full specified same day service, the report states that the contractors attention is focused on ensuring that the actual street cleansing carried out, is done and to the highest standard possible.

Cllr Phil Taylor, Conservative spokesman for Transport and Environment, said: “The news that the Ealing rubbish fiasco is going to last a full six months is really quite shocking.  All along the council has made promises that their contractors have failed to keep. 

“Even this latest admission of failure is based on the starting point that all of the correct vehicles were in place at the end of July.  I saw mixed recycling being collected in the wrong vehicle myself on 8th August in Mattock Lane, Ealing.  The council are kidding themselves again.”

Liberal Democrat Councillor, Gary Malcolm, Clearly Ealing Council wants to do better but it appears that Enterprise are struggling with getting to grips with the contract it won. I say the Council needs to be tougher and ensure that fines or rebates to the Council are issued. Money speaks volumes.

The table below represents a snapshot of key waste and street service contract performance indicators from contract start in April 2012 to July 2012, compared with performance over the corresponding period in 2011.

 

	APRIL		MAY		JUNE		JULY
	2011	2012	2011	2012	2011	2012	2011	2012
Reported missed refuse collections	250	961	478	622	374	565	137	**
Reported missed recycling collections	529	6818	770	2319	528	1488	623	**
Kerbside tonnes recycled*	1259	1258	1292	1532	1491	1619	1312	**
Recycling rate (%)	44.51	40.29	43.88	44.18	44.73	42.38	36.30	**
Green waste collected (tonnes)	842	475	705	279	786	303	775	**
% streets cleaned to grade A	94.20	66.70	93.42	53.50	94.24	59.29	94.52	75.00
Comingled sent to MRF	n/a	1062	n/a	1373	n/a	1483	n/a	**

* Awaiting additional quarterly tonnage data from West London Waste Authority pre landfill treatment operations

**Data not available at the time of report draft

After earlier performing spot checks on the implementation of the service, leader of Ealing Council, Cllr Julian Bell said: “We’ve had unacceptable problems with the waste and recycling service provided by our new contractor Enterprise and the performance has not been at the level we would like. It is our top priority to make Ealing cleaner and exceed the record performance we had earlier this year. We are taking action to make sure that happens.”

August 16, 2012