By Andrew Topping, Local Democracy Reporter
Households in Mansfield disposed of almost 1,500 more tonnes of waste through their bins last year compared with the previous year, new figures show.
Council documents have revealed the exact total of waste collected from the kerbside across the district last year, with 41,524.69 tonnes of waste removed across household, recycling and garden bin collections.
The figure was an increase of 1,493.32 tonnes compared with the 2020/21 financial year, when residents removed 40,039.37 tonnes of waste from their homes across the three separate bin rounds.
Residual household waste collections, the documents state, were when council lorries collected the most waste, with just short of 29,000 tonnes (28,991.39) collected in 2021/22.
This was up from 27,568.35 tonnes collected the year earlier.
For recycling collections, the documents confirm there was a year-on-year decrease in the amount of waste disposed of by residents.
The 2021/22 financial year saw refuse collectors receive 6,752.94 tonnes of recycled waste, down from the 6,930.72 tonnes in 2020/21 during the height of the pandemic.
And the documents also confirm the council’s recycling contamination figure – the amount of waste incorrectly recycled – stood at 15.7 per cent of all items.
This, the authority says, falls short of the targeted five per cent of items, with some glass continuing to appear in recycling waste collections.
This comes despite the authority running a glass recycling service, which collected 2,328 tonnes last year.
The figure includes glass collected from supermarket recycling points as well as the glass bin collections, which are now in their eighth round since the scheme’s launch last year.
However, for the authority’s garden waste collection service – which was recently reduced in price from £31 to £26 – there was again an increase in the amount of waste collected by the authority.
For the 2021/22 financial year, the council saw 5,797.36 tonnes of garden waste collected by its refuse lorries. The figure was a rise from 5,550.30 tonnes the year previously.
The authority states it currently has 19,000 customers for the garden waste service.
And the authority states its number of missed bin collections is under the 0.1 per cent target, despite admitting some collections have been missed due to staff absences and obstructive vehicles.
Ryan Oliff, the council’s waste and recycling manager, said in a report: “A recent review of the data highlighted some issues with some crews accounting for a higher number of missed bins.
“These were usually attributed to long term absences of the usual crew and different agency staff covering that role.
“We created a postcard for crews to notify vehicle owners if they have prevented the refuse vehicle from accessing a street.
“There continues to be a push from the communications team to encourage people to sign up for bin reminders.”
He added two new drivers have been appointed into the refuse fleet, filling vacancies that had been outstanding for four months.
A further two vacancies are being advertised internally for loaders, while the authority is preparing to increase its team further to tackle the rising number of homes in the district.
This would see one new driver and a further two loaders, which Mr Oliff says will “provide resilience for the additional 2,600 properties due to be built in the next four years”.
The figures and Mr Oliff’s report will be reviewed by the council’s overview and scrutiny place committee on Tuesday, June 14.
