Thursday, July 24, 2008

Thanet Council Drop It But Do They Cop It?

Last year our beloved council's anti-litter campaign was 'Thanet is beautiful, let's keep it that way'. And what did they do? Yep, they poggled the place out with temporary fencing, allowed heritage buildings to rot, and condoned endless oozalum flights over the island.

This year's benchmark in hypocrisy is 'Drop it and cop it'. That casually discarded cigarette butt or barker's nest could cost you an £80 fine. So when council operatives scatter Ramsgate's roads and pavements with detritus on bin day, leaving festering rubbish to rot in the streets on the hottest day of the year, shouldn't they fine themselves? After all, they dropped it, so shouldn't they cop it? I called the Uranians to find out...

11 comments:

Linda said...

Well done. I emailed TDC about this exact problem the other week. It seems very stupid to me but we had the street sweeper the day before the dust bags were collected. This is part of the response I received from TDC someone called W Day from Amenities

"The wheelie bin roll out should be rolling out very soon. Properties without the bins are currently being assessed and we expect the roll out (if your property is able to support bins) to be completed by November.

In the meantime, I can only suggest that you double bag your waste which has proven to stop or slow down the seagulls. Use better quality bin bags (as the cheaper variety are thinner and easier to break) or perhaps put your bags in a conventional plastic bin until wheelie bins
are delivered." A tad cheeky I think! Also it is not my rubbish that has been the problem, so would he please give the same information to all the residents?

Well he also mentions informing the street cleaning department about that situation, and since then we haven't seen one at all!!

It is clearly the case that seagulls/foxes rip open the bags, but dustmen drop stuff all over the place and don't attempt to pick it up. I have actually witnessed a throwing fight with bin men using apples from someones bins. How long would it take to pick it up?,not long I guess, but of course I am near Westwood Cross which I presume receives more than my share of attention!!

Linda said...

Well done. I emailed TDC about this exact problem the other week. It seems very stupid to me but we had the street sweeper the day before the dust bags were collected. This is part of the response I received from TDC someone called W Day from Amenities

"The wheelie bin roll out should be rolling out very soon. Properties without the bins are currently being assessed and we expect the roll out (if your property is able to support bins) to be completed by November.

In the meantime, I can only suggest that you double bag your waste which has proven to stop or slow down the seagulls. Use better quality bin bags (as the cheaper variety are thinner and easier to break) or perhaps put your bags in a conventional plastic bin until wheelie bins
are delivered." A tad cheeky I think! Also it is not my rubbish that has been the problem, so would he please give the same information to all the residents?

Well he also mentions informing the street cleaning department about that situation, and since then we haven't seen one at all!!

It is clearly the case that seagulls/foxes rip open the bags, but dustmen drop stuff all over the place and don't attempt to pick it up. I have actually witnessed a throwing fight with bin men using apples from someones bins. How long would it take to pick it up?,not long I guess, but of course I am near Westwood Cross which I presume receives more than my share of attention!!

Anonymous said...

I am visiting Ramsgate in early August for a week so if I find it to be full of litter I wont be comming back. But I wont write to the TDC. They have a duty under the Environmental Protection Act 1990 so I will do you a favour and write to your local MP. The more people that do this and continue doing this until TDC clean it up the more fed up he will become.

Anonymous said...

Wonderful! To the point and amusing with it.

Anonymous said...

Tdc have a zero tolerance policy on dropping litter. I spoke to one of my elderly customers who accidentially lost her shop receipt when leaving a supermarket due to the wind and was fined. Surely a verbal warning/softly approach is sufficient rather than a fine on the first offence. Or is this just another revenue raising exercise? In the College Sq they might as well install a permanent desk there just to issue tickets to people dropping fag ends/litter.

Anonymous said...

Cllr Perkins of Canturbury council describes ours as "run absolutely disastrously" I'd skip the council and see if gale or some "higher authority" can actually do something.

Anonymous said...

Thanet Council seems to pour resources into initiatives that help their business friends, for example widening pavements so cafes can put their chairs and tables out, imposing dispersal zones in town centres so people can go to bars and restaurants (fair enough), but is doing very little to improve the lives of those on the residential fringes of our towns.

Basic services such as rubbish collection need to be got right if they are not to alienate the vast majority of people who voted for them.

Anonymous said...

I think the council operative rumbled you by the end of that call ECR!

Anonymous said...

This supine Council could raise a lot of revenue by fining the seagulls £80 each for litter dropping, or why not go the whole hog and fine owners of properties for having seagulls nesting on them - say £80 a household would raise thousands for the Supine local authority.

Anonymous said...

Why wait till November to give us wheelie bins - the seagulls won't be nesting then. TDC also need to find out where people are just dumping rubbish on street corners and try and catch them.

Anonymous said...

It's not the seagulls fault they are attracted to these areas precisely because TDC has been so woefully inept in introducing the wheelies. And there are still some areas e,g, Ramsgate where they refuse to do anything about this.