South Cambs bins policy is anti-environmental

I AM writing regarding moving to a new home in Cambourne. Apparently, on each house you occupy as a new build, you have to arrange for waste and recycling bins to be ordered from the environmental department of South Cambridgeshire District Council.

A charge of £60 is levied for delivery. You are not allowed to collect the bins as the council has decreed that it is not a designated public access area.

In addition to this, the council has confirmed that bins can be ordered only when you move in and the delivery takes around two weeks. During those two weeks you have to take your household rubbish to the local tip (eight miles away).

So we have a situation where we pay £60, have a delay of two weeks, rubbish during that time is to be taken to the local landfill tip at our cost, we are unable to recycle during that period, potentially attract vermin through rubbish being left out to the elements and then the cost of the carbon footprint by having to take over four to five trips during that period in a car to the landfill.

This charging system was agreed by the councillors at a meeting a while ago. We wonder whether they care about the ordering process and the delays. It also brings into question the reasonable access to council land where we may be able to collect the bins. Don't we taxpayers contribute to the local council, paying for an efficient service that we should receive?

The reality is that, as a family that cares about the environment and the potential carbon and environmental cost associated with a process that doesn't work properly, we, like many other families moving into the area, pay a stealth tax. Where does the money go for that?

South Cambridgeshire District Council should be held accountable for such a bad environmental service to its customers and reconsider the appropriate "green credentials" it aspires to.

MARK RAYNER

Bullrush Lane

Great Cambourne