Council freezes price of Northampton's garden-bin collections for 36,000 subscribers

Northampton Borough Council has frozen the price of its garden waste collection subscription service for next year.

The authority introduced its controversial £42-a-year brown-bin charge in early 2020 offering fortnightly recycling collections only to those prepared to pay for them.

Councillors hope keeping the cost unchanged will retain all of the 36,000 who subscribed to the service last year and attract a few more.

Council leader Jonathan Nunn said: “We’ve kept the charge at the same level as last year, and I encourage residents to renew their subscription early so they can avoid any disruption to the service.

“Subscribing online is straight forward and only takes a couple of minutes – a much quicker job than mowing your lawn.”

Subscription to the paid-for garden waste collection service is not compulsory — residents can also take their garden waste to local Household Waste and Recycling Centres or compost it at home instead. But more than 50 per cent of those eligible sign up for the deal in its first year.

The final collections for 2020-2021 are due at the end of March.

Households wishing to have their garden waste collected after the April 4 will need to subscribe to the service and pay an annual fee of £42 to cover the period from April 5 until April 3 in 2022.

Residents can subscribe to the service HERE at any point in the year, however, no reduction will be offered for those subscribing part way through the year and early subscription is recommended to ensure minimal disruption to their collections.