Bin charges and waste services
Joan Collins condemned rising Greyhound bin charges as a failure of privatisation and called for legislative change. The Taoiseach said waste-service arrangements were largely for councils and noted that different models had produced mixed results.
It was announced last week that Greyhound is increasing its bin charges again. Over the last 18 months, these charges have increased from €16.50 to €30 per month. One woman has said that in June of last year she was paying €22 a month to have her bins collected by Greyhound Recycling and now expects to be paying €30 from July. This is an increase of more than 30%, which is well above the increase in the cost of living. This is a failure of privatisation. People campaigned against this in the 2000s because we knew this would happen. There were strong campaigns of non-payment in Dublin and other counties. People ended up in court and jailed over this issue. The Institute of Public Administration recently released a report on the public ownership of bin services. Dublin City Council has voted in favour of it. The unions have also come out in favour of it. Many of my constituents and others throughout the country would support the remunicipalisation of our waste services. The Government's own waste plans require changes to regulations and legislation. Will the Taoiseach look at the roadmap set out by the Institute of Public Administration, support local councils, unions and ordinary voters, and legislate for councils to take bin services back into public ownership?
Comment on this
I would have to talk to the Ministers, Deputies Darragh O'Brien and Eamon Ryan, about the matter. I know of plenty of examples internationally of both privatisation and remunicipalisation of waste services. There have been different results in different cases. I might be wrong but I would have thought that whether councils are willing to make the investment, pay compensation and do all of those things would be a matter for themselves.
Comment on this
We need legislation as well. Legislation needs to be changed.