Northampton's garden waste subscription service set to hit its target

Northampton's new £42-a-year garden waste recycling service is proving a hit with council tax payers, say Borough officials.

The local authority ditched 'free' brown bin collections for 70,000 households to introduce a subscription service last week, bringing Northampton into line with a number of other local authorities across the country.

More than 20,000 households have already signed up, just short of the target set when the scheme was announced in November.

A Borough Council spokesman said: "We currently have 21,626 subscriptions from 20,383 households.

"So with around 70,000 households with gardens, sign-up currently stands at around 29 per cent and we are on target to exceed our estimate of around 30 per cent participation."

Garden waste collections were provided as part of annual council tax bills.

But from April 6 only subscribers are getting their brown bins emptied fortnightly, while those using sacks will receive the equivalent of two black sacks collected once a week across 50 weeks of the year.

Those with bigger gardens can buy an extra subscription to get more than one bin or extra black sack labels.

Subscriptions have so far brought in more than £900,00 to council coffers.

Critics of the scheme predicted a rise in fly-tipping and domestic bonfires, and opposition leader Danielle Stone branded the scheme "foolish."

More fears of rubbish being left by the roadside and being burnt in gardens were raised when Northamptonshire County Council's recycling centres were all closed on March 24 following Prime Minister Boris Johnson's announcement of a lockdown in a bid to slow the spread of Covid-19.

But the Borough Council spokesman added: "If anything we’ve seen a bit of a reduction in fly-tipping which we’re putting down to social distancing measures."