Councillors are scratching their heads wondering how to tackle ‘uncivilised morons’ who dump rubbish in the streets of Weston-super-Mare.
Concerns were raised at North Somerset Council’s meeting at the Town Hall on September 25 over the cleanliness of the town centre after reports of homeowners slinging bin bags out on pavements, rather than disposing of them in wheelie bins.
Food waste and household rubbish is often seen strewn across the streets of Weston after animals break into bags left on the tarmac.
John Crockford-Hawley, councillor for Hillside ward, slammed the ‘antisocial behaviour’, and called on Cllr Peter Bryant, the authority’s executive member for waste and recycling, to find a solution.
He said: “While most residents act quite responsibly, some are still putting bin liners full of waste onto our streets, bringing gulls and foxes onto our streets and pavements.
“I don’t blame Cllr Bryant for this antisocial behaviour of these uncivilised morons who dump their rubbish every week.
“In fact Cllr Bryant is one of the few executive members when something goes wrong in his portfolio who puts his hand up and admits it.
“But I must ask what waste minimisation action you might be willing to undertake, including the supply of sufficient on-street collection points, so our streets might become a hint cleaner?”
Cllr Bryant responded: “It’s an ongoing problem and every week we are trying to come up with some better way to solve it in Weston.
“Other towns in the district don’t have the problems we have.
“Collection points are one way, but that relies on people being industrious enough to carry all their rubbish to the collection point, and many seem to just want to throw it out on the pavement.
“We are endeavouring to do our very best.”
Central ward Cllr Mike Bell believes Weston is starting to feel the effects of cutbacks to street cleaning budgets, which have exacerbated the mess left by homeowners.
He said: “We’re in a ludicrous situation where we’ve got more cleaning vehicles than members of staff who can man them.
“We’ve got four vehicles, but there are not four trained members of staff who can operate them.”
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