Haringey Council’s new Executive Member for the Environment has been urged to look into the ongoing problem of double charging for waste collection.

This follows more than two years of constant requests from Cllr Matt Davies (Lib Dem, Fortis Green) and Lynne Featherstone MP to rectify the situation.

Residents living in managed blocks of flats are being charged twice for waste collection in Haringey. All residents pay the same Council Tax rates, but those in houses receive a wheelie bin as part of their waste service. In blocks of flats, bins are not provided by Haringey Council and so residents must pay for the hire of bins – in addition to their Council Tax.

“With the new Executive Member for the Environment recently starting his work, I have urged him to look into this matter in the hope that we will progress further in resolving it than we have got recently,” says Cllr Davies.

“It is completely unacceptable that residents who pay the same tax are getting a different level of service. Haringey have provided most households with wheelie bins as part of the rubbish collection process but they have not given people living in blocks similar facilities.

“Whether Haringey Council takes over the charges currently being paid by residents, buys suitable bins outright for residents or renegotiates its contract with Accord to include provision of bins for these tax-paying residents, this is action which must be taken. The current situation is simply unfair and cannot be allowed to continue as it has so far under this Labour administration.”