The ‘Voice’ of desperate rubbish

There are lies, damned lies, and Lib Dem leaflets!

It has come to our attention that a publication called ‘The Voice’ is circulating in the Ward. Among other things it claims to reveal our policies and those of the Conservative Group on recycling. It repeats the old, discredited, nonsensical suggestion that we are opposed to recycling. Nothing could be further from the truth as readers of this blog are already well aware.

The Conservatives haven’t run Kingston since 1994, though we had a minority administration from 1998 to 2002. I was Executive member for Environment in the last year of that and introduced an expansion of recycling from just paper to include plastics, textiles and tin cans in 2001.  We were working on glass door to door when the Lib Dems got a majority in 2002, at which point progress ceased for the next 4 years, until 2006.

Leader Cllr. Howard Jones with 5500 signature petition

We wanted – it was in our 2006 manifesto – to expand the then fortnightly collection of recyclate to a weekly one. Again Cllr. Kevin Davis and I both argued strongly for this at the 2006 Budget Council, only to  be shouted down by the Lib Dems. We wanted the leave the weekly collection of non-recyclables strictly alone instead of going to the present fortnightly collection.

We argued for this consistently throughout the procurement process for the new waste contract in every venue open to us. You will see the matter fully documented, and our policies explained, in this website which runs from November 2006. Feel free to dig around!

A large part of our concern on the fortnightly versus weekly issue stems from experience as ward councillors of the problems many of our constituents face with housing 180 litre bins in small terraced houses and conversion flats. There a lots of these in the Tolworth parts of the ward like Ellerton and Bond Roads and smaller homes as on St Thomas Close, where there are outside bin stores just big enough for the standard 90 litre bin. Such areas are often home to young families with problems around nappies and limited storage capacity. Most residents are coping with these problems, but in some places, as evidenced on the junction of Red Lion Road and School Lane recently, there have been incidences of very unsightly and smelly flytipping.