At the invitation of the Chair, residents shared their experiences of the waste collection and street cleaning in the Merton borough.

Rudi Leoni: Transparency is needed. Merton have refused to publish the deductions and performance of Veolia. FOI exists to protect public funds. IT is still being used as an excuse. Deductions are still being negotiated. Missed collections are still being marked as complete.

Chris Larkman: Good news is streets are cleaner since the introduction of the wheelie bins. Bad news is the end of roads where there are flats, the rubbish is much worse.

Mark Gale: The system doesn’t work. In October road sweepers were halved. The Merton website for reporting issues crashes constantly and Veolia claim not to have received many reports. Surgical needles were left for four days in St Helier.

Mike Nash: We have had to pay someone privately to deal with weeds that are over a meter high. What happened to the weed killers, we used to have them? I have filmed the dust cart driving down the road and then turning straight back around and sent this to my Councillor.

James Leek: I have already circulated fifteen to council officers. Larger households have overflowing bins. The waste is getting better but the streets are bad. Need more humans with brooms. Drains are blocked. Online reporting systems need to be improved.

Michael Marks: Toilet breaks for staff aren’t adequate as crews often relieve themselves in the alleyway. Recycling boxes are too small. Bins are overflowing.

Tom Walsh: Sustainable Merton are looking forward to working with Merton. We employ fifty community champions. Last year we ran a plastic free Merton campaign. Subsequently a lot of companies changed their usage of single use plastics. Heading towards a zero waste society should be the Council’s goal. The Council should double their effort to lobby government to address this. And a ban on single use plastics should be part of the licence granted for public events.

Marie Davinson: Millions of pounds of resident money to implement the new wheelie bin system, yet there has been no improvement with regards to the amount of litter and fly tips left on our streets.

There are many issues: Fly tip hotspots need better monitoring, investigation and enforcement.

Leaves blocking drains, confusion over collection days which is not helped when old signs displaying the former collection day are left up in streets months after the change of day, Street bins are not being emptied frequently enough. It seems that the only time action is taken is when a resident or councillor speak directly with a Veolia manager. Are Merton Council's own procedures the blockage in the system?

Frequently the same problem has to be reported numerous times. Do Veolia even receive these reports? They certainly don’t appear to have access to location details from Merton’s SRQ numbers.

Dan Goode: Shocking fall in street cleanliness, Keep Britain Tidy stresses that a littered environment encourages more litter. Residents endlessly report waste, there is tacit support  ...  view the full minutes text for item 4