One option

REGARDING the fortnightly rubbish collection proposal, I am writing to explain the reason for the proposed weekly kitchen waste collection outlined in last week's Mercury. The point is to keep kitchen food waste out of landfill, in order to avoid massive Government fines of millions of pounds in a few years' time.Councils are allowed to put less biodegradable waste in landfill each year in spite of increased housing, and kitchen waste is about one fifth of all North Somerset's household waste.Next year we hope to try different ways of collecting kitchen waste in a few different streets. One option could be weekly kitchen waste collections with fortnightly rubbish collections. Collections would be from lidded containers provided by the council. The final decision on this will be taken in the budget debate next Spring.Cllr Peter Bryant's attitude in opposing this and garden waste collections is extremely short-sighted. He prefers kitchen and garden waste to go to landfill in Devon rather than see it composted. He keeps quiet about the level of council tax needed to pay over £2m in Government fines in 2009. Presumably he is looking no further ahead than the local elections in May next year and hopes to get votes by pretending that a few bins next year will cost more than the fines they would avoid.In trying out small pilot schemes next year we hope to find out which collection method would be most acceptable to residents.DEBORAH YAMANAKAExecutive member of Environment and CommunityNorth Somerset Council